TV News LIES

Ofer Bronchtein was brought to tears as French President Emmanuel Macron delivered his speech to the United Nations General Assembly in New York in September, recognizing a Palestinian state for the first time.

"Honestly, I cried," he told NPR in an interview in his Paris apartment after his return from New York. "I see it happening in front of me and I see the full room of the General Assembly and everyone is applauding."

Bronchtein says his only regret is that the Israeli delegation walked out of the General Assembly. The Israeli and U.S. governments opposed the move. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said world leaders who recognized Palestinian statehood were granting a "tremendous reward" to the Palestinian militant group Hamas after its Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel, which triggered the war in Gaza.

Bronchtein refutes this, arguing it is no reward for a group that never sought a peaceful coexistence alongside Israel.

"I strongly believe that if there had been a Palestinian state before the 7th of October, if the Palestinians had been sovereign to run their lives as they wanted, the 7th of October [attack in Israel] would not have happened," he says.

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Israel’s military on Saturday launched airstrikes against Hamas militants in Gaza in the latest test of the ceasefire that began on Oct. 10, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said five senior Hamas members were killed. Health officials in Gaza reported at least 24 people killed and another 54 wounded, including children.

The strikes, which Israel said were in response to gunfire at its troops, came after international momentum on Gaza, with the U.N. Security Council on Monday approving the U.S. blueprint to secure and govern the territory. It authorizes an international stabilization force to provide security, approves a transitional authority to be overseen by President Donald Trump and envisions a possible future path to an independent Palestinian state.

Israel has previously carried out similar waves of strikes after reported attacks on its forces during the ceasefire. At least 33 Palestinians were killed over a 12-hour period Wednesday and Thursday, mostly women and children, health officials said.

One of Saturday’s strikes targeted a vehicle, killing 11 and wounding over 20 Palestinians in Gaza City’s Rimal neighborhood, said Rami Mhanna, managing director of Shifa Hospital, where the casualties were taken. The majority of the wounded were children, director Mohamed Abu Selmiya said.

Associated Press video showed children and others inspecting the blackened vehicle, whose top was blown off.

A strike targeting a house near Al-Awda Hospital in central Gaza killed at least three people and wounded 11 others, according to the hospital. It said a strike on a house in Nuseirat camp in central Gaza killed at least seven people including a child and wounded 16 others.

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Donald Trump said on Friday night that he’s “immediately” terminating temporary legal protections for Somali migrants living in Minnesota, further targeting a program seeking to limit deportations that his administration has already repeatedly sought to weaken.

Minnesota has the nation’s largest Somali community. Many fled the long civil war in the east African country and were drawn to the state’s welcoming social programs.

But how many migrants would be affected by Trump’s announcement that he wants to end temporary protective status could be very small. A report produced for Congress in August put the number of Somalis covered by the program at just 705 nationwide.

Congress created the program granting temporary protective status (TPS) in 1990. It was meant to prevent deportations of people to countries suffering from natural disasters, civil strife or other dangerous conditions.

The designation can be granted by the homeland security secretary and is granted in 18-month increments.

The president announced his decision on his social media site, suggesting that Minnesota was “a hub of fraudulent money laundering activity”.

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Less than a year after the Palisades fire destroyed nearly 7,000 structures in Los Angeles, the first completed rebuilt home is being celebrated in Pacific Palisades.

In a statement, mayor Karen Bass confirmed that the Los Angeles department of building and safety had issued the certificate on Friday, certifying that the home had passed inspection and was ready for occupancy.

“The Palisades community has been through an unimaginable year, and my heart breaks for every family that won’t be able to be home this holiday season. But today is an important moment of hope,” said Bass.

“With more and more projects nearing completion across Pacific Palisades, the City of Los Angeles remains committed to expediting every aspect of the rebuilding process, until every family is back home,” Bass added.

The Pacific Palisades home features four bedrooms and 4.5 bathrooms spread across nearly 4,000 sq ft. It replaces a 1,600 sq ft ranch-style home destroyed in January. Across the Palisades and Eaton fire zones, nearly 2,000 rebuilding permits have been issued, according to the LA Times.

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European leaders on Saturday praised President Trump’s reported 28-point plan to end the war between Ukraine and Russia for including “important elements,” but added that the plan needs “additional work” for peace to last.

The proposal would reportedly require Ukraine to relinquish the eastern territory of the Donbas region to Russia and cut its armed forces by half. In a joint statement released by the Council of the European Union, leaders signaled the plan is a good start — but merely a draft.

“We believe therefore that the draft is a basis which will require additional work,” they added. “We are ready to engage in order to ensure that a future peace is sustainable. We are clear on the principle that borders must not be changed by force.”

They added, “We are also concerned by the proposed limitations on Ukraine’s armed forces, which would leave Ukraine vulnerable to future attack.”

The coalition expressed their continued support for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, adding that they “will continue to coordinate closely with Ukraine and the U.S. over the coming days.”

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GOP lawmakers think Bondi fueled the firestorm — which Democrats have delighted in stoking — by telling Fox News anchor John Roberts in February that Epstein’s client list was “sitting right now on my desk to review.”

Months later, the Justice Department and FBI released an unsigned memo asserting there was “no incriminating ‘client list’” and that federal investigators “did not uncover evidence that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties.” That memo provoked widespread skepticism and accusations that the Trump administration wasn’t being fully transparent.

“There’s a https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5617816-senate-republicans-criticize-bondi-justice-department/lot of frustration with the Epstein stuff. People thought the DOJ really mishandled that in general, and unnecessarily elevated that,” one GOP senator, who requested anonymity to discuss frustration with Bondi, told The Hill.

The senator called Bondi’s statement to Fox News in February and the conflicting July memo an “unforced error.”

Bondi has since explained that she wasn’t talking about an actual client list but instead a stack of Epstein-related files and that it was Roberts, the interviewer, who used the words “list of Jeffrey Epstein clients.”

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At least 67 Palestinian children have been killed in the Gaza Strip since a United States-brokered ceasefire agreement came into effect last month, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) says.

Speaking during a news conference in Geneva on Friday, UNICEF spokesperson Ricardo Pires said the death toll includes a baby girl who was killed in an Israeli air strike on a home in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis on Thursday.

It also includes seven other children killed a day earlier, as Israel carried out a wave of attacks across the enclave.

“This is during an agreed ceasefire. The pattern is staggering,” Pires told reporters of the death toll since October 11, the first full day of the truce between Israel and Hamas.

“As we have repeated many times, these are not statistics: Each was a child with a family, a dream, a life – suddenly cut short by continued violence.”

Palestinian children have borne the brunt of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, with UNICEF estimating last month that 64,000 children have been killed and injured in Israeli attacks since the war began in October 2023.

Save the Children reported this week that, in 2024, an average of 475 Palestinian children “suffered lifelong disabilities” each month as a result of the war, including traumatic brain injuries and burns.

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Several high-ranking Army officials, including Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, are in Ukraine to help with peace talks, U.S. officials said Wednesday, as Trump administration efforts to halt Russia’s war in Ukraine have stalled.

Driscoll had been planning a trip to Ukraine for some time to discuss the country’s drone warfare innovations and tactics, but last week President Donald Trump decided to identify him as a kind of “special representative” to kick-start peace negotiations and conduct a fact-finding mission, one of the officials said.

That official confirmed Driscoll is scheduled to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy this week as well as top Ukrainian government, military and defense industry officials.

Driscoll is accompanied by Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George, the service’s most senior officer; Gen. Chris Donahue, U.S. Army Europe and Africa commanding general; and Sgt. Maj. Michael Weimer, the Army’s top enlisted official, an Army official said.

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