Distinction Matter - Subscribed Feeds

The US environmental regulator has finalized rules that could force a ninefold increase in the market share of electric vehicles

US President Joe Biden’s administration has followed through on its pledge to accelerate the phaseout of cars powered by internal combustion engines, unveiling new emissions rules that may force the nation’s auto industry to be dominated by electric vehicles (EVs) in less than a decade.

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released its new emissions standards for passenger vehicles on Wednesday, laying out limits that will start getting tougher in 2027 and ratchet further downward through 2032. The agency said that under one scenario, its 2032 standard could be met if 56% of new cars and trucks sold are EVs and 13% are plug-in hybrids.

EVs accounted for just 7.6% of new vehicle sales in the US last year, meaning the new rules may necessitate a ninefold increase in the segment’s market share. The guidelines are designed to allow automakers to choose the emissions-control technologies they will use to be in compliance, EPA administrator Michael Regan said. However, the industry has already largely given up on hydrogen fuel cells to power its vehicles, so EVs figure to be the primary solution.

“With transportation as the largest source of US climate emissions, these strongest-ever pollution standards for cars solidify America’s leadership in building a clean transportation future and creating good-paying American jobs – all while advancing President Biden’s historic climate agenda,” Regan said. He claimed that the new mandates will reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by more than 7 billion tons over the next three decades.

It’s not clear whether the EPA’s estimates include the emissions that will result from increased generation of electricity to charge millions of new EVs. Coal, natural gas and other fossil fuels accounted for about 60% of the nation’s power generation last year, according to the US Energy Information Administration. And as the EPA has acknowledged, studies have shown that the production of EVs and their batteries generates higher emissions than the manufacturing of conventional cars.

Critics of the new mandates have argued that Biden is essentially forcing US consumers to buy cars that many don’t want or can’t afford. “The Biden administration is deciding for Americans which kind of cars they are allowed to buy, rent and drive,” said Senator Shelley Moore Capito, a West Virginia Republican. She added that the new rules mandate an “unrealistic transition” to EVs and threaten a power grid that is already being weakened by EPA-driven shutdowns of fossil-fueled generators.

READ MORE: Trump mocks Biden over ‘electric tanks’

The sinking of a South Korean vessel has left at least eight crewmen dead and two missing

At least eight crewmen have been killed and two left missing after a South Korean chemical tanker capsized near an island just off the western Japanese coast.

The vessel, named the Keoyoung Sun and owned by South Korea’s Keo Young Shipping Co., sent out a distress call on Wednesday morning near Mutsure Island, according to the Japanese Coast Guard. It was reported to be tilting to one side after anchoring in rough seas and high winds near Mutsure, to the west of Shimonoseki, a port city at the southwestern tip of Japan’s biggest island.

The 28-year-old tanker was loaded with 980 tons of acrylic acid and was operated by a crew of two South Koreans, eight Indonesians and one Chinese national. It was completely capsized by the time Japanese rescuers arrived on scene. The Japanese Coast Guard recovered one surviving crewman, an Indonesian, and the bodies of eight who perished. Two others were still missing as of Wednesday evening.

Japanese media showed images of the ship floating upside down with seawater washing over its red underside. At the time of the incident, the Keoyoung Sun was reportedly bound from the Japanese port of Himeji to Ulsan, one of South Korea’s largest refining and petrochemical hubs. Its captain was South Korean.

The incident comes about one month after an LNG carrier and an overloaded cargo ship collided off South Korea’s southern coast. All 77 people on board the two vessels were rescued. Also last month, 11 crewmen were rescued from a sinking cargo ship in high winds and rough seas near South Korea’s Jeju Island.

A South Korean oil-products tanker sank in October 2022 after taking on water off the coast of Taiwan. One crew member died, and 19 were rescued. South Korea’s worst maritime accident occurred in 2014, when the capsizing of a ferry carrying students on a high school field trip left more than 300 people dead.

An hour of computer use is enough to make a man soft, Chinese scientists have claimed

A new study has found that extended computer use more than triples a man’s risk of developing erectile dysfunction. Long-term screen time, the researchers explained, may lower men’s sperm production and eventually cause impotence.

After analyzing data from more than 220,000 men aged between 40 and 69, Chinese scientists discovered that for every additional 1.2 hours spent using a computer, a man’s chances of experiencing erectile dysfunction (ED) increased by 3.57 times.

The study, published in the ‘Andrology’ journal on Wednesday, set out to see whether different kinds of “sedentary activity” affected men’s erectile function. However, they found “no evidence” to suggest that watching television or driving a car for the same time had the same effect.

The scientists did not examine the effect of computer use on men younger than 40, who are far more likely to spend long periods playing video games or using social media.

While the researchers did not discover exactly how computers affect erectile function, they found that men who spend longer in front of the screen showed higher levels of follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), which is manufactured by the brain’s pituitary gland. Lower levels of FSH cause a drop in sperm production, and could also cause ED, they theorized.

For those suffering from computer-induced ED, the scientists noted that “moderate physical activity may help to correct the dysfunction.”

Aside from their apparent libido-lowering effects, video games have been blamed for all kinds of social ills in China. Beijing recently introduced new rules aimed at reducing “irrational” spending on games, two years after Chinese regulators forbade under-18s from playing online games for more than three hours per week in a bid to prevent the spread of gaming addiction.

Chinese state media described games as “spiritual opium” and “electronic drugs” at the time.

Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar has decided to step down after failing to sell voters on revising the country’s constitution

Ireland’s Leo Varadkar has resigned as Taoiseach (prime minister) amid political backlash over a housing crisis, mass migration, and a failed effort by his government to revise how the country’s constitution defines families and protects the traditional homemaker role of women.

Varadkar announced his decision on Wednesday, saying he will quit as president of the Fine Gael political party immediately and step down as prime minister once his successor is ready to take office. Acknowledging that his resignation would be a “surprise to many and a disappointment to some,” he said Ireland’s ruling coalition would have a better chance of winning reelection under different leadership.

“My reasons for stepping down are both personal and political,” Varadkar told reporters in Dublin. “But after careful consideration – and some soul-searching – I believe that a new Taoiseach and a new leader will be better placed than me to achieve [reelection].”

The decision follows a referendum earlier this month when Irish voters overwhelmingly rejected proposals by Varadkar’s government to replace constitutional references to the makeup of a family and a mother’s “duties in the home.” The prime minister, who had campaigned for the two proposed revisions by arguing that the Irish constitution is “old-fashioned” and “very sexist,” called the defeat “two wallops.”

Ireland is scheduled to hold its next election later this year or in early 2025. Varadkar’s party, Fine Gael, has fallen behind the Sinn Fein party in the polls.

The Irish government has faced rising public anger over a massive influx of asylum seekers from Africa and the Middle East, as well as more than 100,000 Ukrainians who fled the conflict with Russia in their country. The migrant influx has driven a 31% jump in Ireland’s population over the past two decades, contributing to the EU's worst housing shortage and rising crime.

Riots erupted in Dublin late last year, after three children and a school staffer were injured in a stabbing attack – allegedly by an Algerian migrant. Varadkar responded to the uproar by condemning the protestors, saying they were “filled with hate. They love violence, they love chaos, and they love causing pain to others.” He vowed to “modernize” Irish laws, not to crack down on migrant crime, but to punish “incitement to hatred and hatred in general.”

READ MORE: Migrant-loving Western leaders are at war with their own people

Varadkar became Ireland’s youngest head of state on record, as well as its first openly gay leader, when he first took office as prime minister in 2017. Fine Gael failed to win a majority in Ireland’s 2020 election, but Varadkar returned to power in 2022, when his party formed a coalition with the Fianna Fail party and the Greens.

Varadkar campaigned to legalize same-sex marriage in 2015 and to ease Ireland’s strict anti-abortion laws in 2018, achieving monumental changes in a predominantly Catholic country.

Washington reportedly wants to bring new members into the AUKUS pact before Donald Trump’s potential return to power

Canada and Japan could join the US, UK, and Australia in the AUKUS security partnership by the end of the year, Politico reported on Tuesday. The White House wants the deal done before November’s presidential election, which could see the more isolationist Donald Trump return to office, the report claims.

A diplomat involved in the talks told the news site that Canada and Japan could join ‘Pillar 2’ of the pact, under which they would collaborate with the founding members on developing advanced military technology such as artificial intelligence and hypersonic missiles.

AUKUS was established in 2021. Under the pact’s ‘Pillar 1’, Washington and London pledged to help Canberra acquire nuclear-powered submarines, while ‘Pillar 2’ is a broader technology-sharing agreement. Apart from Canada and Japan, India, New Zealand, and South Korea have been floated as potential ‘Pillar 2’ members.

The White House is attempting to fast-track Canada and Japan’s membership, a second diplomat told Politico. US President Joe Biden, the diplomat said, is “pushing really hard to get some things on AUKUS pillar 2 done now, before the US election.” 

Trump is currently the presumptive Republican nominee to challenge Biden in November, and holds a slight lead over the incumbent in most polls. According to the first diplomat, Trump’s “American isolationism is a risk to the Indo-Pacific,” and should he win, Western leaders will phone each other up and ask: “What the f**k are we going to do now?”

“If pillar 2 fails then AUKUS fails, because we could have just had a submarine deal,” the diplomat said, adding: “We’re very confident of getting some of the pillar 2 deals done by the end of this year.”

With elections looming in the UK and Australia next year, London and Canberra are on board with the rapid expansion planned by Washington. An official working at the British Defense Ministry told Politico that “there is an impetus to get pillar 2 done sooner rather than later.” 

Trump’s position on AUKUS is unclear, and the former president has not spoken about the pact on the campaign trail. While Trump was hawkish on China during his presidency and instigated a major trade war with Beijing, he has expressed disdain for multilateral agreements and suggested that he would not defend NATO members who refuse to increase their defense spending.

Beijing has condemned the AUKUS pact as an attempt to build an “Asia-Pacific version of NATO,” with Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin arguing last year that it is based on a “Cold War mentality which will only motivate an arms race, damage the international nuclear nonproliferation regime, and harm regional stability and peace.”

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said that AUKUS “provides for the deployment of a military strategic complex with a nuclear component in the region,” and is “confrontational” by design.

The presence of a certain number of NATO-member forces has been implicitly confirmed, according to Warsaw’s top diplomat

The fact that Western forces are present in Ukraine is now an ‘open secret’, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski has told German press agency dpa.

The statement comes less than two weeks after the minister said the deployment of NATO troops to the country was “not unthinkable,” and that he appreciates French President Emmanuel Macron for not ruling out the idea.

In an interview with dpa on Wednesday, Sikorski stated, “As your chancellor [Olaf Scholz] said, there are already some troops from big countries in Ukraine.” 

Last month during a press meeting, Scholz justified his rejection of the delivery of Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine by saying that Berlin would not participate using soldiers in targeting control, either from Germany or on the ground.

“What the British and the French are doing in terms of target control and accompanying target control cannot be done in Germany,” the chancellor told journalists at the time. His words have been widely interpreted as confirming the presence of Western soldiers in Ukraine.

Asked by dpa whether Scholz’ revelation was a problem, Sikorski responded, “In Polish, we have the expression ‘tajemnica poliszynela,’ which describes a secret that everyone knows.” 

Sikorski reiterated that Warsaw would not send ground troops to Ukraine, citing historical reasons. “Ukraine and Poland have been one country for 400 years. This would provide fodder for Russian propaganda. Therefore, we should be the last ones to do so,” he concluded.

The Polish diplomat, however, welcomed the French president not taking the option of sending ground troops off the table.

Macron said in late February that he “cannot exclude” the possibility of soldiers from the US-led military bloc being sent to aid Kiev. The statement sparked a wave of denials from the leaders of NATO member states, who insisted they harbor no plans to deploy combat troops to Ukraine. He doubled down this month, saying that Paris recognizes no limits or Russian “red lines” when it comes to backing Kiev. Europeans “will have to live up to history and the courage that it requires,” the French leader insisted.

In his recent address to Russia’s Federal Assembly, Russian President Vladimir Putin commented on the talk of “deploying NATO military contingents to Ukraine,” by saying that all previous attempts to conquer Russia have ended in failure, and that “now the consequences for potential invaders would be far more tragic.”

The protesters oppose what they see as excessive EU environmental requirements and unfairly cheap imports from Ukraine

Polish farmers intensified nationwide protests on Wednesday, decrying EU agricultural policies and the flood of duty-free imports from Ukraine. Tens of thousands of agricultural workers are blocking roads in several hundred locations across the country, according to media reports.

The demonstrators have blocked the main roads leading out of the capital of Warsaw with tractors and other agricultural equipment, numerous media outlets have reported.

“We have run out of arguments. We need to work in the field, spring has already come, but there is no point in this, since we will not earn anything, so we are here,” one of the protesters, a farmer who called himself Krzysztof, told RIA Novosti.

The roads leading to the German-Polish border have also been blocked. Footage from the area shows dozens of vehicles parked on the motorway, blocking traffic.

Police have been called to the sites where the demonstrators are gathered, but there have been no reports of clashes so far.

According to media reports, Polish farmers were planning a total of more than 500 road blockades on Wednesday, pledging to “paralyze” the country. Polish police said they were aware of over 580 protests planned for Wednesday and expect roughly 70,000 people to take part.

Protests by farmers have been taking place in Poland and across other EU states for weeks. The demonstrators have been calling for changes to the restrictions placed on them by the bloc’s environmental policies – the so-called Green Deal – and for a halt to imports of agricultural products from outside the bloc, primarily Ukraine. The farmers complain that they are unable to compete with the cheap Ukrainian imports that are flooding EU markets.

Despite the outcry by farmers, earlier on Wednesday, Brussels reached a provisional agreement to extend Ukraine’s duty-free access to its markets until June 2025. However, the agreement introduces an “emergency brake” on imports of poultry, eggs, sugar, oats, maize, groats, and honey if they exceed the average levels of 2022 and 2023. However, the Polish protesters opposed the deal, saying they want the reference point for import limits to be the years prior to the Ukraine conflict, as volumes were much lower then.

READ MORE: EU extends tariff-free trade with Ukraine  

Last week, EU lawmakers also proposed easing certain environmental rules, such as measures targeting crop rotation, in a bid to stem the protests. This will be among the topics for discussion by the agriculture ministers of member states at their next meeting on March 26.

In yet another gaffe, the US president suggested that Norway, one of the bloc’s founders, joined only last year

US President Joe Biden has confused two Nordic countries, Finland and Norway, as he touted the latest wave of NATO expansion amid the Ukraine conflict.

Speaking at the campaign event in Reno, Nevada, on Tuesday, Biden recalled a conversation with former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in the autumn of 2023, a few days before his death.

According to the US president, the veteran diplomat told him that many European countries “looked over [their] shoulder at Russia with some dread” until the US set its foot on the continent. Biden also claimed that Kissinger praised him for “strengthen[ing] NATO like it’s never been strengthened before.”

“You’ve united Europe in a way. You’ve increased NATO and the border of NATO from bringing in Sweden and Norway.” He further quoted Kissinger as saying, “it’s changed the world.”

Biden was apparently referring to Finland, which shares a 1,340 km border with Russia, that joined Sweden in applying for membership in the US-led military bloc shortly after the start of the Ukraine conflict. Finland became a NATO member in April 2023. Sweden only joined earlier this month, after dealing with grievances from Hungary and Türkiye.

Norway, meanwhile, was one of NATO’s founding members at the bloc’s inception in 1949.

The US president has been ridiculed for recurring gaffes. Earlier this month, speaking to MSNBC, Biden claimed that Washington “shouldn’t have gone into Ukraine,” when in fact he was alluding to Iraq and Afghanistan. Late last month, he also mistakenly referred to Chinese leader Xi Jinping as “the head of Russia.”

Biden last week secured enough delegates in the Democratic primaries to clinch his party’s nomination for this November’s presidential election in which he is almost certain to face archival and Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump.

At the same time, a recent survey by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that 63% of American adults are not very or not at all confident in Biden’s mental capability to serve effectively as president. Trump also did not fare well, with 57% voicing concern about his mental capacity.

Prosecutors accuse Truong My Lan of orchestrating an embezzlement scheme that caused more than $20 billion in damages

A property tycoon in Vietnam could face the death penalty in a corruption trial over alleged fraud that is considered the largest in the Southeast Asian nation’s history, according to local media reports.

Truong My Lan, chairwoman of real estate developer Van Thinh Phat Holdings Group (VTP), allegedly embezzled over 304 trillion dong ($12.5 billion) from Saigon Joint Stock Commercial Bank (SCB), which she effectively controlled through “thousands of ghost companies” between 2012 and 2022, the newspaper Vietnam+ reported on Monday, citing court documents. A further 193 trillion dong ($7.8 billion) in damages came from accumulated interest on the loans that Lan and her accomplices allegedly took from the bank.

The total damages the alleged scam caused amounts to roughly 498 trillion dong ($20 billion), or about 4.69% of Vietnam’s GDP.

Lan has also been accused of bribing officials to ignore her activities, including a payment of $5.2 million she allegedly made to a senior central bank inspector, prosecutors said. Apart from Lan, 85 other people are being probed in connection with the case.

The tycoon was arrested when the investigation was launched back in October 2022. Her trial is expected to run until the end of April. Prosecutors are demanding that she receive a death sentence for embezzlement, 20 years in prison for bribery, and up to 20 years for violating the country’s financial regulations.

“During the trial, Truong My Lan did not admit to the crime, was stubborn, blamed her subordinates and didn’t show remorse. The defendant’s actions caused extremely serious and irreparable consequences, so Truong My Lan should be permanently removed from society,” Vietnam+ cited the prosecutors as saying.

Lan’s representatives have not responded to media requests for comment on the proceedings.

VTP was one of Vietnam’s most profitable real estate companies, with projects ranging from luxury residential buildings and offices to hotels and shopping centers. It held some of the most luxurious properties in the country’s commercial hub, Ho Chi Minh City.

Lan’s trial is part of an anti-corruption drive that started in 2022, which has seen thousands of officials within the highest levels of government and business executives investigated.

The former US president faced virtually no opposition as all other main Republican candidates have dropped out of the race

US Republican frontrunner Donald Trump has easily won the GOP primaries in five more states, with incumbent leader Joe Biden doing the same with the Democrat Party, as the pair moved towards a rematch in November’s presidential election.   

Trump scored landslide victories on Tuesday in Arizona, Florida, Illinois, Kansas, and Ohio, securing the support of all the delegates.   

He faced little opposition as all of his high-profile Republican rivals, including former US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, have already dropped out of the race.   

With the exception of Haley, who has stated that Trump must “earn” the backing of her voters, all of the previous Republican hopefuls have endorsed the former president.

Trump had already secured the support of a majority of delegates last week, making him the presumptive GOP nominee for the November vote.   

Biden made similar strides in the Democratic primaries on Tuesday, securing the support of all delegates in the same five states. In Florida, the incumbent leader was the only candidate on the ballot.   

Like Trump, Biden has already won enough delegates to become his party’s presumptive nominee, facing almost no opposition within the Democrats. While both candidates have essentially locked up their respective nominations, they are expected to be formally selected at the Republican National Convention in July and the Democratic National Convention in late August.   

The US presidential election will be held on November 5. According to the latest Morning Consult survey, Trump and Biden are tied among registered voters, with each receiving 43% of support. However, a February Bloomberg News/Morning Consult poll found Biden trailing his rival in seven swing states – Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, North Carolina, Nevada and Wisconsin.

The parliament has passed a resolution calling for an end to weapons deliveries as the war in Gaza continues

Canada will halt future arms sales to Israel, Foreign Minister Melanie Joly told the Toronto Star on Tuesday.

The statement came after the parliament passed a resolution on the matter amid a growing push among MPs to condemn Israel’s military operation against the Palestinian militant group Hamas in Gaza, which has entered its sixth month.

Despite the non-binding nature of the document, Joly confirmed that the government will cease the transfer of weapons to Israel. “It is a real thing,” she said, answering a reporter’s question.

The parliamentary motion was part of a larger vote originally put forward by the minority left-leaning New Democrats (NDP), who pitched it as a way to revive peace talks and support the Palestinians. The resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza was passed on Monday after MPs agreed to tone down its language and include a demand that Hamas “must lay down its arms.”

The document calls on Ottawa to “cease the further authorization and transfer of arms exports to Israel,” the CBC reported on Tuesday. The original text demanded the suspension “of all trade in military goods and technology with Israel.”

The resolution also calls for “the establishment of the State of Palestine as part of a negotiated two-state solution.”

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz condemned Joly’s remarks on X (formerly Twitter), arguing that the refusal to sell weapons “undermines Israel’s right to self-defense against Hamas terrorists.” He added that “history will judge Canada’s current action harshly.”

Hamas launched a series of raids on Israel on October 7, killing more than 1,100 people and taking more than 200 hostages. Israel’s subsequent military operation in Gaza has killed nearly 32,000 Palestinians, according to the local health authorities.

Despite the mounting international calls for a lasting ceasefire, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated on Tuesday that the Israel Defense Forces will continue their advance on Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah, which he described as a stronghold of the militants. “We do not see a way to eliminate Hamas militarily without destroying these remaining battalions,” he told legislators.

Judges have denied a request by the Biden administration to block the implementation of a controversial new state law

The US Supreme Court has rejected an emergency request by President Joe Biden’s administration to block enforcement of a new law in Texas that will allow police to arrest illegal migrants crossing into the state from Mexico.

The 6-3 ruling was issued on Tuesday, allowing the new law to go into effect as it continues to be challenged in the lower courts in a US Department of Justice (DOJ) lawsuit. Texas Governor Greg Abbott welcomed the decision, calling it a “clearly positive development,” but he acknowledged that the state’s legal battle with the Biden administration is not over.

Texas has been at the forefront of a campaign by Republican-governed states to press for stronger border security amid the influx of illegal migrants across the border with Mexico.

Abbott has deployed National Guard troops and state troopers to put up barriers at the border since Biden took office in January 2021. He has defied Biden’s demands to stop such practices, saying the federal government has failed at its constitutional duty to defend the states.

The controversial new law, known as SB4, enables state and local law enforcement officers to arrest migrants who illegally cross the border. It also allows Texas judges to order the deportation of illegal immigrants. The Biden administration has insisted that only the federal government has jurisdiction over border security.

“We fundamentally disagree with the Supreme Court’s order allowing Texas’ harmful and unconstitutional law to go into effect,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement. “SB 4 will not only make communities in Texas less safe, it will also burden law enforcement and sow chaos and confusion at our southern border.”

The high court’s ruling was divided along partisan lines, with the six judges appointed by Republican presidents voting to allow implementation of the Texas law and the three Democrat-appointed justices dissenting. “The court gives a green light to a law that will upend the longstanding federal-state balance of power and sow chaos,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a dissenting opinion.

READ MORE: Biden and Trump to visit Mexican border on same day

Biden’s critics have argued that his policies have led to chaos at the border, enabling record flows of illegal migrants, including suspected terrorists, and causing increased drug trafficking. Abbott and other Republican governors have sent busloads of illegal immigrants to Democrat-ruled cities, such as New York and Chicago, to draw more attention to the border crisis. New York Mayor Eric Adams has warned that the surge in migrant arrivals is straining local government resources, threatening to “destroy” America’s largest city.

Vengeance on Biden, curbing illegal migration, ending support for Kiev – The Donald will have a busy schedule should he win the presidency, but how much can he accomplish?

In the event of another Trump presidency, will the Orange Man restrain the desire to seek vengeance on his political enemies, or will he succumb to the temptation to play ‘dictator for a day’, unleashing mayhem in the process?

Perhaps it would be the understatement of the century to say that Donald Trump has a grudge to bear. Not only was his first term as president overshadowed by the dual hoaxes known as Russiagate and Ukrainegate, but the legal entanglements continue to follow him out of office as well. This has made Orange Man the first former president in American history to be hounded with state and federal lawsuits. And should he get elected to another four years in the Oval Office, nobody should be surprised if the reprisals against his arch-nemesis begin in earnest.

“If I don’t get Immunity, then Crooked Joe Biden doesn’t get Immunity,” Trump fumed in January on his social media site. “With the Border Invasion and Afghanistan Surrender, alone, not to mention the Millions of dollars that went into his ‘pockets’ with money from foreign countries, Joe would be ripe for Indictment.”

This sort of vendetta mentality is more worrisome in light of Trump’s stated desire to play “dictator for a day.” While it’s unclear what sort of cases the former president intends to bring against Biden, we can expect every legal channel available from the height of his office will be explored – investigations into high treason, abuse of office, corruption, mishandling of classified documents, etc.

As he wraps up his business with the Biden clan, Trump won’t waste any time revisiting the signature issue that got him elected president in 2016, which was his promise to secure the border and build a wall. This will prove to be a messy affair as the US military, working in cahoots with local law enforcement, will be tasked with carrying out sweeping raids aimed at deporting millions of illegals around the country.

Trump floated the idea of doing something similar during his first term, but he was refuted by attorneys over fears of legal repercussions. This time around, however, he will surround himself with more obedient staff, who are already dreaming up ways to make a militarized border “perfectly legal.”

Despite fierce criticism from human rights organizations, the Trump administration will also suspend asylum requests by people arriving at the border, while halting birthright citizenship for children born on US soil to undocumented parents. Meanwhile, the concept known as ‘sanctuary cities’, which gives illegal migrants the ability to settle around the country at huge expense to taxpayers, will be abandoned altogether due to ‘violations of constitutional law’.

On the question of crime, which has exploded on Biden’s watch, Trump proclaimed that our “once great cities have become unlivable, unsanitary nightmares, surrendered to the homeless, the drug-addicted, and the violent and dangerously deranged.” His plan to address the crisis is to prohibit urban camping and contain the homeless in tent cities, which will be overseen by “doctors, psychiatrists, social workers, and drug-rehab specialists.” Trump said the money the US saves from “ending mass, unskilled migration” will cover the costs.

On the energy front, Trump will roll back Biden’s policies, which are ostensibly engineered towards saving the planet from climate change, a concept that does not resonate in Republican circles. Trump will shelve the Democrat’s solar and wind projects, while bringing back his own vision of delivering endless supplies of oil from Canada through the Keystone XL pipeline.

On the foreign scene, Trump began a trade war with China in 2018, and that reckless policy looks set to continue. As an integral part of his ‘Make America Great Again’ program, the Republican candidate continues to view the Asian economic superpower as an enemy rather than a robust trading partner (trade between the US and China amounted to $758 billion in goods and services last year). Trump has pledged to begin “aggressive new restrictions on Chinese ownership of assets in the US, bar Americans from investing in China and phase in a ban on importing key categories of Chinese-made goods like electronics, steel and pharmaceuticals.”

Trump has an equally suspicious view of Washington’s relations with NATO, especially those members of the Western military bloc that are in arrears on their membership payments. The presidential candidate’s campaign website contains one cryptic line on the matter that will keep Brussels up at night: “We have to finish the process we began under my administration of fundamentally re-evaluating NATO’s purpose and NATO’s mission.”

Despite tense relations with the bloc, Trump says that, should he be elected president, he will end the Ukraine conflict “in twenty-four hours.” How would he pull off that magic trick? By cutting Kiev off from the gravy train, which has already delivered Zelensky and the military industrial complex tens of billions of dollars of US taxpayer money. Considering the latent militancy the pervades Capitol Hill, however, curbing this appetite for destruction may represent the toughest uphill slog for Trump 2.0.

Lloyd Austin has made a grim prediction about Kiev’s battlefield prospects

Ukraine’s very survival could be at stake unless the West sends more military aid, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said on Tuesday. 

The head of the Pentagon was in Germany for a meeting of the so-called Ukraine Defense Contact Group at Ramstein Air Base, in his first overseas trip since his hospitalization in January. 

“Today, Ukraine’s survival is in danger and America’s security is at risk,” Austin said at a press conference after the meeting. 

Keeping the weapons, equipment and ammunition flowing is “a matter of survival and sovereignty for Ukraine” and “a matter of honor and security for America,” he added.

He did not say how the US intends to support Ukraine without additional funding. The bill that would provide over $60 billion in assistance to Kiev is still stuck in the US House of Representatives.

US “inaction” has already resulted in Ukraine losing ground on the battlefield, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at Tuesday’s press briefing. President Joe Biden, a Democrat, has been trying to pressure the Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson to approve the Ukraine funding for months, so far without success.

After the Ramstein meeting, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius announced a package of  weapons and ammunition for Kiev worth €500 million ($543 million).

Washington had used up almost all the congressionally approved funding for Kiev. The Pentagon has asked Congress for at least $6.5 billion to replenish its own depleted stockpiles. On Friday, the White House announced it had managed to put together a package of ammunition worth $300 million from various “savings” at the Pentagon, but warned that this would only support Ukraine for a couple of weeks. It was the first batch of US funding since the start of 2024.

Meanwhile, the US has urged Ukraine to expand its mobilization to younger men in order to fill up the badly depleted ranks of frontline brigades.

Ukrainian forces lost the key Donbass fortress of Avdeevka last month, pulling back in disorder before the advancing Russian forces, and have been taking heavy casualties in open battle ever since. The battle has prompted French military analysts to conclude that Kiev can’t possibly win on the battlefield, according to classified reports leaked to the outlet Marianne earlier this month.

Berlin will raid its own stocks and buy ammo from foreign suppliers to keep Kiev fighting, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has said

Germany will supply Ukraine with €500 million ($543 million) worth of weapons and ammunition, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius announced on Tuesday. Despite shortages of manpower and ammo at home, Berlin has pledged to spend €7 billion on military aid for Kiev this year.

“We have once again put together an aid package worth almost half a billion euros,” Pistorius told reporters at a meeting of the so-called Ukraine Defense Contact Group at Ramstein Air Base on Tuesday.

The package will include 10,000 artillery shells from Bundeswehr (German military) stocks, with deliveries to begin “immediately,” Pistorius said. 100 infantry vehicles and 100 unarmored vehicles will also be sent, the minister added.

Germany will also purchase 180,000 shells from non-EU suppliers as part of a larger initiative led by the Czech Republic, and another 100,000 directly from defense contractors, Pistorius announced.

READ MORE: German living standards in ‘unprecedented post-WW2 slump’ – report

Germany is Ukraine’s second-largest Western backer, behind only the US. To date, Berlin has given Kiev €22 billion ($23.7 billion) in assistance, including €17.7 billion in military aid, according to figures compiled by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy. When aid transferred via the EU is included, Germany has handed over a total of €28 billion to Ukraine, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said in February.

Scholz and Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky signed a “long-term” security pact last month, under which the German chancellor pledged to give Ukraine an additional €7 billion in military aid this year, and continue arming Kiev for the next decade.

However, this outlay has hurt Germany’s own military readiness. A parliamentary report published last week identified shortages of ammunition, spare parts, tanks, ships, and aircraft, as well as an aging and shrinking workforce.

While these issues predated the conflict in Ukraine, the report found that they have become “even greater” since Scholz began pulling weapons and equipment from German stocks to send to Kiev. Despite Scholz’ announcement of a €100 billion rearmament program in 2022, German soldiers told the New York Times last year that they still lack adequate ammo for training exercises, live in substandard barracks, and have not gotten to fire the Bundeswehr’s latest howitzers, all of which have been sent to Ukraine. 

A list has been released that includes nineteen ‘neutral’ competitors from countries sanctioned over the Ukraine conflict

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has issued a list of athletes from Russia and Belarus it will allow take part in the Summer Games in Paris. 

Twelve Russian athletes and seven of their Belarusian counterparts have qualified to compete in the 2024 Olympic Games, but only as neutral athletes, as of March 19, the IOC’s Director for Relations with National Olympic Committees, James Macleod, has announced, according to media reports.

The maximum number of Russians who can qualify for the 2024 Olympic Games will be 55, according to the report. Belarus, meanwhile, is limited to sending 28 athletes.

According to the IOC decision, Russian ‘neutral’ athletes are prohibited from taking part in the opening ceremony. The decision on their participation in the closing of the games will be made later, Macleod noted.

Individual Neutral Athletes (AINs) from both countries “will not participate in the parade of delegations and teams during the opening ceremony since they are individual athletes, but will be given the opportunity to observe the event,” according to Macleod.

READ MORE: Russian champion wrestler barred from Olympics qualifier – sport official

The IOC originally banned Russian and Belarusian athletes from competing internationally following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022. Last year, however, the blanket ban was reconsidered by the organization, and individuals, but not teams, were allowed to participate provided that they do so under a neutral flag and on the condition they “do not support the war and are not linked to the military, or to other services.”

Commenting on the original ban, Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested that such policies could end up burying the Olympic movement, insisting that “sport is outside of politics.”

ABC has defended the film that Kiev’s envoy, Vasily Myroshnychenko, denounced as a “bowl of vomit”

The Ukrainian ambassador to Canberra has demanded a meeting with the management of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation after it aired a documentary about the Ukraine conflict that wasn’t to his liking. 

On Monday evening, the ABC showed British filmmaker Sean Langan’s documentary ‘Ukraine’s War: The Other Side’, featuring Russian soldiers and civilians in the Donbass.

In a post on X (formerly Twitter) on Tuesday morning, Ambassador Vasily Myroshnychenko called the program “the journalistic equivalent of a bowl of vomit” and claimed it “unquestioningly repeated and aired countless blatant lies, historical distortions, racist claims and propaganda narratives emanating from the Kremlin.”

The ABC “should be ashamed that it put such total garbage to air,” added Myroshnychenko, accusing Langan’s documentary of serving the interests of Russian President Vladimir Putin. 

The Australian Federation of Ukrainian Organisations chimed in as well, claiming the film featured “gross lies, hate and genocidal intentions” that caused them distress. The AFUO accused Langan of “fist-bumping, handshaking, hugging and smiling alongside Russian soldiers” and conducting “unchallenged interviews.”

Kiev’s ambassador demanded a meeting with the ABC management in order to “understand what process led to the airing of this pro-Putin and pro-violence propaganda piece” and “share with them the facts that the program totally disregarded.” 

Australia’s Minister for Communications Michelle Rowland reportedly forwarded Myroshnychenko’s request to the broadcaster.

ABC has publicly responded to Ukrainian protests by defending the documentary as an important contribution to understanding the conflict.

“Ukraine’s War: The Other Side is a challenging but legitimate documentary, made by reputable journalist Sean Langan and first aired last month on the UK’s ITV, that offers a rare insight into the lives of Russian soldiers during the war,” an ABC spokesperson said. “We believe Australian audiences also have the right to watch it and make up their own minds.”

Canberra has followed Washington’s lead in backing Kiev, sending more than $600 million of weapons and ammunition, including howitzers and Bushmaster armored vehicles. However, Australia has drawn the line at fighter jets and helicopters, choosing to decommission them instead.

Ukraine’s government has sought to crack down on any deviations from its narrative in the West about the conflict with Russia. In August 2022, Kiev attacked the US outlet CBS News over a report about some Western military aid going missing. The outlet quickly caved and deleted its documentary.

The erectile dysfunction drug could ward off cognitive decline, new research suggests

Sildenafil, the generic name for Viagra, may not only treat erectile dysfunction and pulmonary arterial hypertension, but also ward off cognitive decline, according to research published by the Cleveland Clinic Genome Center earlier this month.

The authors of the study, published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease on March 1, found that those who took sildenafil were 30% to 54% less likely to be diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. The researchers used real-world patient data from the MarketScan Medicare Supplemental database (2012-2017) and the Clinformatics database (2007-2020) to arrive at the conclusion.

The research was focused on those taking sildenafil or four comparator drugs, including bumetanide, furosemide, spironolactone, and nifedipine. Comparators are existing marketed drug products, or new drugs in development, including placebo versions. Gender, age, race, and concurrent diseases of the patients were factored in.

The study concluded that the use of sildenafil was associated with reduced likelihood of Alzheimer’s relative to the control drugs. The results also showed that the drug activates genes in neurons that affect cell growth, improves brain function and reduces the risks of inflammation.

READ MORE: Scientists warn against ‘miracle’ Alzheimer’s drugs

“We used artificial intelligence to integrate data across multiple domains which all indicated sildenafil’s potential against this devastating neurological disease,” said Feixiong Cheng, director of the Cleveland Clinic Genome Center, who led the study.

Similar conclusions about sildenafil were made by researchers from University College London earlier this year. The study, published in the journal Neurology last month, included nearly 270,000 men who were diagnosed with erectile dysfunction and had no cognitive problems at the beginning of the research work. Those taking the drugs were 18% less likely to develop the dementia-causing condition.

Like this story? Share it with a friend!

The head of the Talant commune has said he cannot accept his subordinate’s “collusion” with Moscow

The mayor of the commune of Talant in Cote-d’Or, southern France, Fabian Ruinet, says he has decided to suspend his deputy, Cyril Gaucher, for working as an international observer during the presidential election in Russia.

Ruinet wrote on Facebook on Monday that he learned from the media that Gaucher – the deputy mayor in charge of public services, urban and rural planning, and digital technologies – traveled to Moscow to observe the vote, which took place from March 15 to 17.

The mayor claimed that his subordinate was directly “appointed by the Kremlin,” and that this information came from “several confirmed sources.”

“I cannot agree with such collusion between the Russian authorities and the elected representative of the French Republic… For this reason, I have decided to immediately suspend Cyril Gaucher from executing his duties,” Ruinet said.

Gaucher is apparently still in Russia. The mayor added that he will demand an explanation from his deputy upon returning to France.

In a separate statement, Ruinet claimed that “the election could not have been validated” by Gaucher in any case, as the “true representative of the opposition” did not take part in the vote.

Gaucher’s Les Republicains (LR) liberal-conservative party told BFM TV that it is now considering expelling him, BFM TV reports.

“He endorses the electoral process in Russia, which is mind-boggling,” LR’s leader, Francois-Xavier Dugourd, told the outlet. The stance of the deputy mayor is “completely opposed” to that of the party, he added.

The head of the Russian Central Election Commission, Ella Pamfilova, said earlier that a total of 1,115 international observers from 129 countries, including Europe and North America, oversaw the election. Pamfilova described them as “courageous professionals” who were not afraid to come to Russia and see how the election was run for themselves, instead of trusting the “flow of lies coming from the obedient Western media.”

READ MORE: Putin scores historic win in Russian presidential election – official results

According to the official results of the election, the incumbent Vladimir Putin won his fifth term in office by a landslide, claiming 87.28% of the vote. His opponents, Communist Party candidate Nikolay Kharitonov, Vladislav Davankov of the New People party, and Leonid Slutsky of the Liberal Democrats, secured 4.31%, 3.85%, and 3.20% respectively. The election saw a turnout 77.44%, the largest ever in Russia.

The Canadian fighter was allegedly struck by a Russian drone   

A French-Canadian mercenary fighting for Kiev and alleged leader of the so-called ‘Norman Brigade’ private military group has been killed, Canadian broadcaster CTV News reported on Tuesday.   

Reports about the death of the mercenary, identified as 36-year-old Jean-Francois Ratelle from Quebec, first circulated through social media, the outlet said. According to media reports, Ratelle, an ideological Nazi whose call sign was ‘Hrulf’, was reportedly the commander of the Norman Brigade private foreign unit in Ukraine’s Foreign Legion.   

He was reportedly struck by a Russian drone along with others from his unit, which allegedly comprises mercenaries from the US, UK, Germany, France, Denmark, Poland, Australia, and New Zealand.   

Global Affairs Canada, the department in charge of foreign policy, said it was aware that a Canadian had died in Ukraine but would not provide his name or cause of death, CTV News said.  

“Our hearts go out to his family and loved ones at this very difficult time,” the outlet quoted spokesperson Grantly Franklin as saying. “Consular officials are in contact with local authorities for further information and are providing consular assistance to the family.”  

The name of Ratelle’s group alludes to the fact many Quebecers are descendants of settlers from France’s Normandy region. The group consists almost entirely of military veterans, according to the National Post.   

In 2022, the Norman Brigade reportedly took part in battles near Kiev before being transferred to Donbass, where it suffered heavy losses. It was also reported that Ratelle had embezzled funds intended for the unit.  

Canada has been among the strongest supporters of Kiev during the conflict. According to the latest estimates released by Russia’s Defense Ministry last week, of the more than 1,000 Canadians who went to fight for Ukraine, at least 491 have died. Canada has a large Ukrainian community, mostly originating from the post-WWII era, when Ukrainian Nazi collaborators fled to the country en masse to escape retribution by the Soviet Union.  

Last September, the Canadian Parliament honored 98-year-old Yaroslav Hunka, a former Ukrainian Waffen-SS soldier, with a standing ovation. The veteran was celebrated at the House of Commons in Ottawa in the presence of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky.    

Hunka has publicly admitted to volunteering to join the Waffen-SS Galicia Division during the Second World War.  

The incident was condemned by Russia, Poland, and the UN, while the Canadian opposition accused Trudeau of lying about his role in the affair. House Speaker Anthony Rota took the blame for the incident and resigned.   

In October 2023, Russia charged Hunka with genocide and issued a warrant for his arrest. Russian diplomats have pointed to the incident as proof of Nazi influence in Canada.

“Wherever there is a terrorist, we’ll find and eliminate him,“ the Turkish leader said

Türkiye’s military is set to carry out operations to achieve full security along the country’s borders, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said.

In January, Türkiye carried out a series of airstrikes and ground operations in northern Iraq and northern Syria, targeting members and facilities of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which Ankara views as a terrorist organization. The escalation followed the death of nine Turkish troops in clashes with the PKK fighters.

The goal of the government in Ankara is to make sure that Türkiye is free from “the dark shadow of terrorism,” Erdogan said during a speech on Monday.

In order to achieve this, “we will completely guarantee the security of our Iraqi border by this summer and will definitely complete our unfinished business in Syria,” he stated.

”Wherever there is a terrorist, we’ll find and eliminate him,” the Turkish leader said, adding that the country “will absolutely not allow these hired killer gangs, who are now gasping for breath, cornered, and on the verge of extinction, to revive and become a burden on our nation again.”

Earlier this month, Hürriyet newspaper reported that the Turkish military was going to conduct a large-scale ground offensive in northern Iraq against the PKK. The government in Baghdad has consented to the military operation on its territory, according to the outlet.

High-ranking officials from the two countries held a security summit in Baghdad last week, saying in a joint statement that “the PKK poses a security threat to Türkiye and Iraq and… that the presence of the said organization on Iraqi territory violates the Iraqi constitution.”

Turkish forces have been deployed in northern Syria since 2016 amid a conflict in the country with the declared goal of fighting Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) and other terrorist groups.

The authorities in Damascus condemned the incursion, which was carried out by Ankara without their consent, as an “aggression” against the Syrian state and “a blatant violation” of the country’s sovereignty.

READ MORE: Türkiye arrests hundreds for alleged ISIS links

Erdogan, who has joined Western calls for regime change in Damascus throughout the conflict, said last summer that he was open to a meeting with his Syrian counterpart Bashar Assad with a view to mending relations. However, he said the withdrawal of Turkish forces from Syria’s Idlib province shouldn’t be a precondition for the talks.

A UN-backed report warns that mass death is imminent without an immediate ceasefire and food supplies

Famine conditions now exist in the northern part of Gaza, a UN monitor group warned on Monday. Around 300,000 people remain trapped in the area, following months of Israeli bombardment that has left over 31,000 people dead.

The UN-backed report also warns that more than 70% of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million faces “catastrophic hunger.” The Integrated Food-Security Phase Classification (IPC) said that mass death is now imminent without an immediate ceasefire and deliveries of food aid to the areas affected by the fighting.

More than a dozen children in Gaza, including newborn babies, have starved to death and many more are at risk from soaring malnutrition. UN aid agencies warned earlier in March that urgently-needed humanitarian aid is being blocked from entering the Palestinian enclave. 

The IPC estimated that two out of every 10,000 people will die daily from starvation, malnutrition, and disease if not helped immediately.

“The actions needed to prevent famine require an immediate political decision for a ceasefire together with a significant and immediate increase in humanitarian and commercial access to the entire population of Gaza,” the report said.

Israel has been criticized by its Western partners since it began launching retaliatory strikes against Hamas militants following their attack on Israel on October 7.

“In Gaza we are no longer on the brink of famine. We are in a state of famine,” EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said at the opening of a conference on humanitarian aid for Gaza in Brussels on Monday. He also accused Israel of “using starvation as a weapon of war.”

Foreign Minister Israel Katz responded by saying, “Israel allows extensive humanitarian aid into Gaza,” and told Borrell “to stop attacking Israel and recognize our right to self-defense against Hamas’ crimes.”

Efforts to reach a truce between Hamas and Israel are ongoing, with no breakthrough so far as the hostilities continue. Heavy fighting erupted on Monday in and around Gaza’s Al-Shifa hospital complex. The Israeli Army said it was combatting Hamas militants there and advised civilians to evacuate.

Beijing is reportedly working behind the scenes to convince the EU to invite Moscow to a potential international summit

China will boycott international peace talks on the Russia-Ukraine conflict unless Moscow has a seat at the table, Politico reported on Monday, citing officials familiar with the matter. 

According to outlet, the message was “amplified” during Chinese Eurasia envoy Li Hui’s European tour earlier this month. Li met with Andrey Yermak, the chief of staff to President Vladimir Zelensky, while in Kiev on March 7.  

Ukraine will likely be discussed during German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s visit to China next month. Chinese President Xi Jinping will then travel to Paris in early May and meet his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, Politico said.

The South China Morning Post reported this month that Li told EU officials that a potential peace summit cannot turn into “a conference that produces a plan that is pushed down the Russians’ throat.” 

China has refused to blame Russia for the ongoing conflict and has stressed that the fighting can only be stopped through diplomatic means. In 2023, Beijing unveiled a 12-point roadmap to a peace settlement, urging both sides to de-escalate. Kiev has since rejected the proposal.

Ukraine insists that peace can only be negotiated on Zelensky’s terms, which include the withdrawal of Russian forces from “illegally occupied” territory. Moscow has rejected the demands as a non-starter, stressing that it will not surrender Crimea and four other former Ukrainian regions that joined Russia after holding referendums.

Negotiations between Moscow and Kiev effectively broke down in the spring of 2022, with both sides accusing each other of making unrealistic demands. Russian President Vladimir Putin subsequently said that Ukrainian negotiators had initially agreed to some of Moscow’s terms, but then abruptly reneged on the deal. 

Kiev’s lead negotiator, David Arakhamia, revealed in November 2023 that his team’s main goal was to “buy time” for the Ukrainian military.

Switzerland has proposed to host a major peace summit sometime this year. However, no specific date has been set, and no list of potential participants has been revealed. 

The US president was told in October that Israeli airstrikes were often carried out without “solid intelligence,” the newspaper claims

The White House knew since late October that Israel was regularly bombing civilian targets in Gaza, but President Joe Biden continued to publicly defend the Israeli military’s conduct, the Washington Post reported on Monday.

On October 27, three weeks into Israel’s war with Hamas, Biden’s top foreign policy officials told a small group at the White House that “Israel was regularly bombing buildings without solid intelligence that they were legitimate military targets,” the newspaper wrote, citing three sources familiar with the meeting. 

The officials also expressed concern that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had no clear plan for defeating the Palestinian militant group, with one source telling the Post that “from the very beginning, there’s been a sense of us not knowing how the Israelis were going to do what they said they were going to do.”

At the time, the US was rushing military aid to Israel. Two weeks before the meeting, Biden visited the Jewish state and publicly declared that “as long as the United States stands…[Israel] will not be alone.” On the same day as the meeting, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters that the US would not impose any “red lines” on how Israel conducted its military campaign.

The meeting did little to change the rhetoric of Biden or his officials. The president didn’t criticize Israel over the repeated bombing of a refugee camp in early November. Likewise, the White House publicly backed Israel’s decision to bomb Gaza’s largest hospital later that month, with Kirby telling reporters that Hamas had hidden a command center beneath the facility. 

Behind the scenes, however, US officials worried that such a statement would be seen by the Israelis as a “green light” to attack the hospital, the Washington Post reported. Democratic Senator Chris van Hollen told the newspaper that there was “some disconnect” between what Kirby said and what US intelligence reports actually showed, without explaining further.

Amid growing discontent from his own voters, Biden has since become more critical of Netanyahu. As early as January, the US president claimed that he was “quietly working with the Israeli government to get them to reduce and significantly get out of Gaza.” However, “When those conversations yielded little result, US officials offered few public rebukes and no evident consequences,” the Post’s sources said.

“At every juncture, Netanyahu has given Biden the finger,” van Hollen told Axios in January, declaring that the Biden administration is “pleading with the Netanyahu coalition, but getting slapped in the face over and over again.”

Netanyahu announced on Friday that he had approved plans to attack the city of Rafah in southern Gaza. Rafah is currently home to more than a million Palestinians displaced from other parts of the enclave, and Biden told MSNBC earlier this month that an Israeli operation there would cross a “red line.” 

Biden partially walked his comments back moments later, telling MSNBC that Netanyahu “has a right to defend Israel,” but must “pay more attention to the innocent lives being lost.”