TV News LIES

As first light reaches the scattered tents and animal pens of Ras al-Ahmar in the northern Jordan Valley, the silence is broken only by the cries of thirsty livestock waiting for water that no longer comes.

Days after Israeli forces destroyed three of the Palestinian community's main water wells, residents are scrambling to secure enough water for their families, crops and animals in one of the occupied West Bank's driest regions.

For 60-year-old Ali Bani Odeh, the destruction of the wells was more than merely the loss of infrastructure. A father of four and grandfather of 14, he has spent decades farming and raising livestock to support his family in Ras al-Ahmar.

Now, like dozens of other families, he is uncertain how long they can continue living on the land without a reliable water supply.

"Water is everything for us," Ali told Middle East Eye.

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Several people with no apparent connection to the Nolan Wells case have been criminally charged with making threats amid questions surrounding the Mississippi teenager’s death in July.

The death of the 18-year-old Mississippi college freshman has drawn widespread attention since he was found dead following a boat trip to Horn Island, several miles off the Mississippi Gulf coast, with a group of friends.

Wells’s death has also heightened racial tensions: Wells was Black and three friends he was with were white. The case has prompted speculation on social media, with users questioning whether Wells’s death could have been racially motivated, as well as claims of defamation amid the investigation into the case.

In the weeks since Wells’s death, several threats have been made against Mississippi public officials.

One case centers on allegations against Michelle Francine Edwards of Cincinnati, Ohio. She has been charged with one count of transmitting a threatening communication in interstate commerce.

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A compromise between Todd Blanche and two Republican senators that potentially cleared the way for Blanche’s confirmation as attorney general is weak, Democrats and several experts said, as it makes promises Donald Trump can easily reverse.

Blanche, the acting attorney general, posted two documents on Sunday evening showing he was withdrawing an 18 May order allowing for the creation of a $1.8bn weaponization fund and clarifying that broad tax immunity the justice department granted to Trump only applied retroactively to the president, his sons, and businesses.

he agreement stemmed from a deal worked out with senators John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, two Republicans who had threatened to block Blanche’s nomination. Cornyn and Tillis said on Monday they would support Blanche when his vote comes up for the Senate judiciary committee Tuesday.

“We are pleased that the Department of Justice has issued a formal order terminating the anti-weaponization fund,” Cornyn and Tillis said. “Additionally, the department has acknowledged in a binding written order that the audit settlement is limited to the plaintiffs and the scope does not extend beyond the defendants in the lawsuit, the IRS and the treasury, addressing concerns that multiple of our Republican colleagues share.”

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An immigrant being held at a New Jersey ICE detention center died on 1 August, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced on Monday. Edwin Lopez-Cornejo, 41, is the 22nd person to die in ICE custody this year, according to agency data.

Lopez-Cornejo, who is originally from El Salvador and first came to the US in 2006, was arrested by ICE agents in Plainfield, New Jersey, on 18 June and sent to Delaney Hall detention facility to await deportation. Less than two months later he suffered an unspecified “medical emergency”, and was later pronounced dead by University Hospital in Newark, New Jersey, ICE said.

Lopez-Cornejo’s mother, Maria Cornejo told the New Jersey Monitor newspaper that her son had held a job since 2022 and tried to show the arresting officers his work permit, but he was detained anyway. Though she says she spoke to her son daily, she was unable to visit him because she is not a US citizen.

“I never got to see him. He didn’t get to see his daughter for six weeks,” she told the Monitor. “When we told her what happened, she let out a big scream and hasn’t been the same since. She can’t sleep or eat. Neither can I.

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A joint intervention between Japan and the Trump administration has caused the U.S. dollar to sink against the yen. 

Markets show the U.S. dollar sits at 156.80 yen as of Monday morning after reaching a 40-year high of 164 yen in July.

The drop follows the Treasury Department’s decision to sell off euros for yen on Friday in an effort to intervene on behalf of Tokyo’s deflating currency. 

The amount of euros used to purchase yen was not made clear by the Financial Times, which reported the move launched by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

Sales were conducted through Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, two people familiar with the matter told the outlet.

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Federal prosecutors dropped the last of their cases against people charged with vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool in Washington, DC.

The U.S. Attorney's Office in DC had filed charges of vandalism in connection with damage to the iconic DC pond against David Hearn, Justin Carreno, Sophie Dennison-Gibby and Cameron Thiers. President Donald Trump had previously described the supposed pool-damaging culprits as "SICK, DERANGED PEOPLE."

The office for U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro, however, decided to drop the cases against all four people after concluding that contractors, not vandals, were to blame for the pool’s deteriorated state. Court records obtained by USA TODAY show that prosecutors filed paperwork to drop all of the cases on Friday, July 31.

USA TODAY has reached out to Pirro for comment. The move to drop the last of the Reflecting Pool cases comes after Trump has repeatedly alleged the pool was vandalized.

"To me, it was a pure case of VANDALISM," the president said as late as Saturday, Aug. 1, in a statement on an official Trump social media account. "There may have been some contractor difficulty, but the major damage was caused by VANDALS!"

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Israeli ministers and lawmakers led a march towards the Gaza Strip on Sunday, calling for the re-establishment of settlements in the Palestinian enclave.

Thousands joined the demonstratiohttps://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israeli-ministers-lead-march-calling-settlements-gazan, organised by the Nachala settler movement under the slogan, "Returning home after 21 years", referring to Israel's 2005 withdrawal from Gaza.

Nachala said at least 28 ministers and lawmakers took part, including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir and members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party.

Addressing the crowd, Nachala leader Daniella Weiss said she is often asked: "What will happen to the Arabs in Gaza?"

"There will be no more Arabs in Gaza," she declared.

Smotrich told supporters: "We erased the disgrace of the expulsion in northern Samaria, and with God's help, we will do the same here in the Gaza Strip," referring to the re-establishment of settlements in parts of the northern occupied West Bank evacuated in 2005.

Ben Gvir said, "There will be Jewish settlements in all of Gaza."

"Encourage voluntary immigration [of Palestinians to other countries], send those who need it to their countries. And we return home. Gaza is ours," he added.

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Dr Mazen Rantisi, a 71-year-old Palestinian physician popularly described as the “doctor of the poor”, says he has suffered physical abuse and medical neglect since Israeli authorities detained him more than a month ago, Haaretz reported on Sunday.

The doctor, known for often waiving fees, supplying medicines and operating a clinic that serves as a refuge for low-income Palestinians, was detained in a pre-dawn raid on his home in Ramallah in the occupied West Bank on 21 June. Prosecutors later indicted him for serving as chairman of the board of the Union of Health Work Committees, a Palestinian non-profit that provides medical care to thousands of Palestinians each year.

According to the report, Rantisi told a lawyer from the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel that prison authorities withheld his regular medication for the first 10 days in Ofer prison and are still denying him one of his medicines.

His requests to see a doctor went unanswered, and a medic checked his pulse only once through a small opening in the cell door.

Rantisi also reported physical violence, saying that said the prison units raided his cell several times a week and beat detainees.

“The younger prisoners surround me to protect me, taking the beatings themselves,” Rantisi said, adding that the guards sprayed tear gas into the cell during one raid, leaving him struggling to breathe.

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