TV News LIES

Former Columbia University student and Palestinian rights activist Mahmoud Khalil is now a step closer to being deported from the US after the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) issued a final removal order in his case on Thursday. 

The judges who make up the BIA do not operate as an independent judiciary. The BIA falls under the control of the executive branch of government - in this case, the Trump administration.

The same applies to all immigration courts, which operate under the purview of the Department of Justice. 

Khalil's lawyers maintain that the decision to remove him from the country is in direct retaliation for his pro-Palestine speech. They are going to appeal, they said in a statement.

Khalil has a separate, ongoing federal case regarding what his team said were violations of his constitutional rights, which means he cannot be rearrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or deported until that case is closed.

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The president of the United States threatened this week to commit genocide against Iran. As Israel engages in continued bombing in Lebanon, killing more than 200 people in a single day, that fact must never be scrubbed away, not least because there is no guarantee the threat will not be revived. But as we descend towards the abyss, we need to understand where our fall began.

“A whole civilisation will die tonight, never to be brought back again,” Donald Trump wrote on Tuesday. Just over a year ago, he announced: “A civilisation has been wiped out in Gaza.” The connection is not hard to trace. Trump knew Gaza had been razed by Israel, insisting it was “not a place for people to be living”. When he joined forces with the perpetrator of that genocide in an illegal war on Iran, the apocalyptic rubble of Gaza became a template.

For two and a half years, western politicians and media outlets normalised Israel’s wholesale shredding of international law. Opponents of the genocide in Gaza warned this would unleash a boundless violence. They were right.

The US-Israeli war on Iran began with the mass killing of 175 people, most of them schoolgirls, in the city of Minab. When it happened, there were hardly any outraged front pages, nor nearly enough strong denunciations of the US from western leaders. But what did we expect? The west had already normalised the killing of more than 20,000 Palestinian children. Many were incinerated in their beds; others deliberately shot in the head, chest and genitals, according to western doctors who served in Gaza. Now 763 Iranian schools are reportedly damaged or destroyed – but did the west not facilitate the same fate for almost every single school in Gaza?

According to the Iranian Red Crescent, 316 medical centres have also been severely damaged or destroyed, but did the west not normalise the Israeli attack on every hospital in Gaza and the killing of at least 1,722 health workers?

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The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is making some of its staffers relocate and reassigning an even larger share of employees as part of its efforts to reorganize its scientific research.

The agency is reassigning a total of 124 staffers, 35 of whom are being asked to relocate.

The move comes as the Trump administration seeks to eliminate its Office of Research and Development and instead conduct scientific research in a new office housed within the office of the administrator.

An EPA spokesperson said via email Thursday that as part of the restructure, the agency “has issued reassignment notices to those employees who remain in the Office of Research and Development.”

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Rep. Eric Swalwell’s (D-Calif.) campaign for California governor lost two co-chairs and key endorsements on Friday after the San Francisco Chronicle reported on allegations that he sexually assaulted a former staffer.

The Chronicle reported that a woman who previously worked for Swalwell alleged that he sexually assaulted her twice when she was too intoxicated to consent. The Hill has not independently verified these claims. Swalwell denied the allegations in a statement to the outlet.

“These allegations are false and come on the eve of an election against the frontrunner for governor,” Swalwell told the Chronicle. The Hill has reached out to his campaign for additional comment.

In the wake of the reporting, Rep. Jimmy Gomez (D-Calif.) resigned as co-chair of Swalwell’s campaign and called on the congressman to “leave the race now so there can be full accountability without doubt, distraction or delay.” The other campaign co-chair, Rep. Adam Gray (D-Calif.), wrote on the social platform X that he is withdrawing his support of Swalwell and urged the gubernatorial candidate to end his campaign.

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Federal prosecutors urged U.S. District Judge Anthony J. Trenga in a March 31 court filing to overturn a lower court ruling that prohibited the DOJ from using a “filter team” to search reporter phone and laptop as part of an FBI investigation into a government contractor accused of leaking classified material.

Magistrate Judge William Porter ordered in February that the government could not “open, access, review, or otherwise examine” any of Natanson’s “seized data,” instead authorizing an independent judicial review.

“Given thee government’s filter team to search a reporter’s work product—most of which consists of unrelated information from confidential sources—is the equivalent of leaving the government’s fox in charge of the Washington Post’s henhouse,” Porter wrote. documented reporting on government leak investigations and the government’s well-chronicled efforts to stop them, allowing the government’s filter team to search a reporter’s work product—most of which consists of unrelated information from confidential sources—is the equivalent of leaving the government’s fox in charge of the Washington Post’s henhouse,” Porter wrote.

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A Democratic lawmaker filed articles of impeachment on April 6 against President Donald Trump, though it faces unlikely odds of succeeding in a Republican-controlled Congress.

The impeachment resolution from Rep. John Larson, D-Connecticut, included 13 articles alleging Trump committed high crimes and misdemeanors for his conduct across a range of policy initiatives. It includes his actions taken in Iran, Venezuela and Gaza; his use of the National Guard in American cities; and his use of the presidential pardon power, among others.

"Donald Trump has blown past every requirement to be removed from office. And it's getting worse. His illegal war in Iran is not only driving up prices for American families — it has cost American lives,” Larson said in a statement. “He's becoming more unstable by the day. His profane and sacrilegious Easter Sunday and subsequent threats, including ‘a whole civilization will die’ and ‘open the Strait…or you’ll be living in hell’ not only foreshadow war crimes, but put our security at risk."

Larson is not the first lawmaker to introduce resolutions to impeach Trump since he returned to office. But the efforts have not been backed by all Democrats and were unlikely to pass the Republican-led House, let alone receive a two-thirds majority from a Republican-controlled Senate needed to convict and remove him from office.

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As millions of people held their breath, the four Artemis II astronauts flawlessly splashed down back to Earth in the Orion capsule, ending their history-making 10-day mission to the moon and back.

"We are back in the business of sending astronauts back to the moon. This is just the beginning," NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said from the deck of USS John P. Murtha, which is acting as the recovery ship for the Orion spacecraft.

“I’m honestly still at a loss for words,” a jubilant Isaacman said. "The childhood Jared right now can’t believe what I just saw."

The splashdown, which happened in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego at 8:07 p.m. EDT / 5:07 p.m. PDT, followed a harrowing and dangerous reentry, where NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch, as well as the Canadian Space Agency's Jeremy Hansen, traveled at speeds up to 25,000 mph ‒ possibly faster than humans have ever traveled.

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A hacking group aligned with Iran said it obtained at least 19,000 sensitive files after targeting the personal phone of former Israeli army Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi.

In a statement posted on its website on Thursday, the Handala Hack Team said it carried out a years-long operation against Halevi, gaining access to what it described as "more than 19,000 confidential images and videos from the most secret meetings".

"All your top-secret facilities, crisis rooms, maps, and even the tiniest details of your command centers have long been like an open book to us," the group said.

Marking what could be one of the most severe cyber incidents involving a senior figure in Israel's security establishment, the files, some of which were seen by Middle East Eye, showed Halevi meeting with Arab officials.

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