“Today is a tragic day. It’s a day of boundless sorrow, of indescribable pain. Four-year-old Ariel Bibas, his baby brother one-year-old Kfir and 84-year-old Oded Lifshitz were brutally murdered by Hamas savages. Their bodies return home to a nation in mourning. A nation that will never forget and never forgive the evil that cut down these beautiful souls. Since that black day on October 7th, when Hamas butchered and burned 1,200 of our families and friends, Israel waited with bated breath, hoping beyond hope that our hostages would survive the Hamas hell. Against all odds, we succeeded to bring many home. Some we rescued. Some we tragically couldn’t. The Bibas children in particular became the symbol of who we are, and who we’re fighting against. Here is a photo of the Bibas brothers.

Israel has confirmed receiving a list from Hamas with the names of six hostages scheduled for release from Gaza tomorrow. The Prime Minister’s Office stated that the hostages’ families have been notified and urged the public not to spread unverified information or speculation. Hamas previously identified the hostages as Tal Shoham, Omer Shem-Tov, Eliya Cohen, Omer Wenkert, Avera Mengistu, and Hisham al-Sayed. Their names had already been shared earlier this week when their families were informed. (YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

Senators are ready to stay up all night, having launched a budget “vote-a-rama” late Thursday in a crucial, if dreaded, step toward unleashing a $340 billion package President Donald Trump’s team says it needs for mass deportations and security measures that top the Republican agenda. If ever there was a time to watch Congress in action, this might be it. Or not. Senators will be voting in rapid fashion for hours on one amendment after another diving into intricate policy details, largely from Democrats trying to halt the package. The result will be a final push by the Republicans, expected in the early hours of the morning, to use their majority power to pass it on a party-line vote.

President Donald Trump says Elon Musk will be looking at Fort Knox, the legendary depository in Kentucky for American gold reserves, to make sure the gold is still there. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent says there is an audit every year and that “all the gold is present and accounted for.” The United States Bullion Depository at Fort Knox has stored precious metal bullion reserves for the United States since 1937 and has become synonymous for secure and well protected. Along with protecting gold reserves, Fort Knox is currently also used as the Army’s human resources command center, and it hosts the Army’s largest annual training event each summer. “We’re going to open up the the doors. We’re going to inspect Fort Knox,” Trump said in a speech to Republican governors Thursday evening.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams is in a state of legal and political purgatory. The first-term Democrat is waiting on a judge to rule on a Justice Department request to dismiss a federal indictment charging him with accepting lavish travel perks and illegal campaign contributions from foreign interests seeking to buy his influence. And he’s waiting on the political fallout — namely, whether Gov. Kathy Hochul will go beyond guardrails and seek to remove him from office amid concerns that he’s compromised his independence by relying on President Donald Trump’s administration to end his criminal case. Adams testified under oath at a hearing Wednesday on the Justice Department’s request, insisting there was no quid pro quo arrangement to shelve his criminal case.

Nearly 200 Venezuelan immigrants to the U.S. were returned to their home country after being detained at Guantanamo Bay, in a flurry of flights that forged an unprecedented pathway for U.S. deportations. U.S. and Venezuelan authorities confirmed the deportations that relied on a stopover in Honduras, where 177 Venezuelans exited a U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement flight and boarded a Venezuelan plane bound for Caracas. The government of President Nicolás Maduro said it had “requested the repatriation of a group” of Venezuelans “who were unjustly taken” to the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. With the request accepted, an aircraft with the state-owned airline Conviasa picked up the migrants from Honduras.

Ever since the October 7th massacre, we’ve heard nonstop about the IDF’s intelligence failures—how they ignored warning signs, how they were unprepared, how Hamas caught them off guard. And yes, those failures are real, and they must be addressed. But what we almost never hear about is the person who led us to this moment, the man who made all of this possible: Ariel Sharon. It was Sharon, not the current government, who handed Gaza to Hamas on a silver platter. It was Sharon who ignored the Mossad, the Shin Bet, the IDF, and every security expert who warned him that a unilateral withdrawal from Gaza would turn it into a terror state. And it was Sharon who dismissed those warnings with a wave of his hand, convinced he knew better. And now?

Agam Berger, the IDF soldier who made a tremendous Kiddush Hashem when she was released about two weeks ago, met with Rebbetzin Tzili Schneider, the head of the Kesher Yehudi organization and media personality Shneor Webber, and shared with them how she was shomer mitvos in captivity. “About a year ago, the terrorists brought us a siddur they found in the area,” she said. “They asked us what it was and gave it to us, and we used it throughout our captivity. It wasn’t a coincidence. It came just when we needed it.” She added that “they found all sorts of things that the army had left behind, like a dog tag, and they simply brought them to us. They also showed us maps that the army left, thinking we could help interpret them. Of course, we didn’t.

Gov. Kathy Hochul won’t immediately remove New York City Mayor Eric Adams from office, but will instead push for increased oversight of City Hall as he faces intense scrutiny over his bribery case and his relationship with the Trump administration. Hochul announced Thursday that she has, for now, decided against using her authority to remove Adams over concerns that such a move could result in “disruption and chaos” and would ultimately be undemocratic. “New York is facing a grave threat from Washington,” she said at a news conference in Manhattan.

The Trump administration is once again targeting California’s controversial high-speed rail project, with federal transportation officials on Thursday announcing an investigation and possible withdrawal of about $4 billion in federal funding. Voters first approved $10 billion in bond money in 2008 for a project designed to shuttle riders between San Francisco and Los Angeles in less than three hours. It was slated to cost $33 billion and be finished by 2020. But the project has been beset by funding challenges, cost overruns and delays. Now, state officials are focused on a 171-mile (275-kilometer) stretch connecting the Central Valley cities of Bakersfield and Merced, which is set to be operating by 2033.