Digging crews resumed work early Thursday in the effort to locate a woman who authorities fear died after falling into a sinkhole above an abandoned Pennsylvania coal mine. Fewer than a dozen searchers, including state police and excavator operators, have returned to the spot where 64-year-old Elizabeth Pollard is thought to have plummeted through a freshly opened sinkhole about three days ago. Authorities said late Wednesday they no longer think they will find Pollard alive. She was last seen Monday evening, searching for her lost cat, Pepper. Her car was discovered some 10 hours later, not far from her house in the village of Marguerite, with her 5-year-old granddaughter inside, unharmed.

The acting director of the Secret Service is promising accountability for what he called the agency’s “abject failure” to secure the rally where a gunman opened fire on Donald Trump last summer during his presidential campaign. Ronald Rowe is set to testify Thursday in front of a bipartisan House task force investigating how the Secret Service, which protects the highest echelon of American leaders, performed during two assassination attempts against Trump in two months. A portion of Rowe’s remarks was released before the hearing. The task force’s inquiry is one of a series of investigations and reports into the July shooting in Butler, Pennsylvania, that have faulted the troubled agency for planning and communications failures.

Tension boiled over between Rep. Pat Fallon and acting Service Service Director Ronald Rowe Jr. during an otherwise cordial hearing on Thursday. The high-drama moment came as Fallon (R-Texas) used a photo of a 9/11 remembrance event to ask Rowe Jr. about his role at the event. Fallon accused him of putting other Secret Service agents out of their usual positions so he could be more visible at the event. He is visible in the photo standing near President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, Donald Trump, JD Vance and congressional leaders. “Do not invoke 9/11 for political purposes,” Rowe Jr. yelled. “You are out of line.” As Rowe Jr.

Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez hosted a magnificent pre-Chanukah celebration at Brooklyn Law School, attended by over 200 members of the Jewish community across New York City. NYPD Deputy Chief Richie Taylor introduced the DA, calling him a unifier, and a strong partner in fighting anti-Semitism and hate crimes. DA Gonzalez spoke about his appreciation to the community for their support and reiterated his perpetual commitment in protecting the Jewish community and all communities. DA Gonzalez awarded Rabbi Eli Mansour, Mark Treyger and Chief Richie Taylor with Proclamations, honoring each of them for their leadership and service.

By Rabbi Yair Hoffman The American legal system is an adversarial system – where opposing sides fight vigorously before an impartial judge or jury in order to best discover truth.  From a Torah perspective, since it is very hard to find qualified people with a high moral compass, this is probably good for the country and also an effective means to get to the truth. The problem is that there is another area that also has an adversarial system, and this is probably not good for the country and not an effective means of improving quality. What is that other area?  It could be that I do not know what I am talking about, but I would like to share a story that could give us some insight into the tragic murder of the United Healthcare CEO.

President-elect Donald Trump campaigned on the promise that his policies would reduce high borrowing costs and lighten the financial burden on American households. But what if, as many economists expect, interest rates remain elevated, well above their pre-pandemic lows? Trump could point a finger at the Federal Reserve, and in particular at its chair, Jerome Powell, whom Trump himself nominated to lead the Fed. During his first term, Trump repeatedly and publicly ridiculed the Powell Fed, complaining that it kept interest rates too high. Trump’s attacks on the Fed raised widespread concern about political interference in the Fed’s policymaking.

The head of Britain’s armed forces has warned that the world stands at the cusp of a “third nuclear age,’’ defined by multiple simultaneous challenges and weakened safeguards that kept previous threats in check. Admiral Tony Radakin, chief of the defense staff, said Britain needs to recognize the seriousness of the threats it faces, even if there is only a remote chance of Russia launching a direct nuclear attack on the U.K. or its NATO allies. While the Cold War saw two superpowers held at bay by nuclear deterrence and the past three decades were characterized by international efforts to restrict the spread of nuclear weapons, the current era is “altogether more complex,” Radakin said Wednesday in a speech to the Royal United Services Institute.

The masked gunman who stalked and killed the leader of one of the largest U.S. health insurance companies on a Manhattan sidewalk used ammunition emblazoned with the words “deny,” “defend” and “depose,” a law enforcement official said Thursday. The official was not authorized to publicly discuss details of the ongoing investigation and spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity. UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, 50, died in a dawn ambush Wednesday as he walked to the company’s annual investor conference at a Hilton hotel in Midtown, blocks from tourist draws like Radio City Music Hall and the Museum of Modern Art. The words on the ammunition may have been a reference to strategies insurance companies use to try to avoid paying claims.

English Jewry is preparing for what might be the largest, most monumental Torah event in England, this coming 14 Kislev/December 15. The Kinnus Olam HaTorah, as its name implies, will be a gathering of the entire Torah community in England – London, Manchester, and Gateshead. Every person who attends during this difficult time for Klal Yisrael, will be coming to derive chizuk and guidance from Gedolei Yisrael. The event, to be held in the large Cooper Box Arena in downtown London, will also serve as a maamad of chizuk in Torah that will feature a siyum on Masechta Shabbos and the haschalah of Masechta Eruvin in the new Dirshu Amud HaYomi program.

Members of the OPEC + alliance of oil exporting countries will decide Thursday whether to put off plans to pump more crude amid sluggish demand and competing production from non-allied countries — factors that could keep oil prices stagnant into next year. Key beneficiaries of that would be U.S. motorists, who have seen gasoline prices fall to their lowest in 2 1/2 years to near $3 a gallon. OPEC+, which includes Saudi Arabia as the dominant member of the OPEC producers’ cartel, and Russia as the leading non-OPEC member in the 23-country alliance, is holding an online meeting over whether to put off production increases that are scheduled to take effect Jan. 1. Eight OPEC+ members planned to start increasing production from Jan.