Tulsi Gabbard, President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to lead the U.S. intelligence services, in 2022 endorsed one of Russia’s main justifications for invading Ukraine: the existence of dozens of U.S.-funded biolabs working on some of the world’s nastiest pathogens. Moscow claimed Ukraine was using the labs to create deadly bioweapons similar to COVID-19 that could be used against Russia, and that Russian President Vladimir Putin had no choice but to invade neighboring Ukraine to protect his country. In fact, the labs are public and part of an international effort to control outbreaks and stop bioweapons.

by Rabbi Yair Hoffman (yairhoffman2@gmail.com) It was an extremely emotional levaya because he was so beloved. The levaya began with essah ainay. Then mimaamakim Rav Moshe Brown shlita spoke first. Many years ago, he remembered in Baltimor, the RY had a picture of Rav Hutner on the wall of his foyer. RMB asked why does he give a krechtz everytime he passes? Rabbi Kalish, when he was very young, the trajectory in his life was to a baki beshas. There are people here that knew him from HILI.  A baki beshas, who was marbitz Torah beRabbim, who worked on middos – he became an ish nichbad me’od me’od The Gemorah in Yuma says that the Name of Hashem should be beloved by your actions.

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The IDF announced that two soldiers were killed in combat this morning in the northern Gaza Strip. The fallen soldiers were identified as: Captain Yogev Pazy, 22, from Giv’ot Bar, who served as a platoon commander. Staff Sergeant Noam Eitan, 21, from Hadera. Both soldiers were members of the Kfir Brigade’s Nachshon Battalion. The IDF reported that another soldier from the same battalion sustained serious injuries during the incident and is currently receiving medical treatment. The IDF expressed condolences to the families of the fallen soldiers and reaffirmed its commitment to supporting them during this difficult time. Further details about the circumstances of the incident that caused the deaths were not immediately disclosed. (YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

The 2024 presidential election featured sky-high turnout, approaching the historic levels of the 2020 contest and contradicting long-held conventional political wisdom that Republicans struggle to win races in which many people vote. According to Associated Press elections data, more than 152 million ballots were cast in this year’s race between Republican Donald Trump, now the president-elect, and Democrat Kamala Harris, the vice president, with hundreds of thousands of more still being tallied in slower-counting states such as California. When those ballots are fully tabulated, the number of votes will come even closer to the 158 million in the 2020 presidential contest, which was the highest turnout election since women were given the right to vote more than a century ago.

Patrons at Murph’s Tavern are toasting not just Donald Trump’s return to the presidency but the fact that he carried their northern New Jersey county, a longtime Democratic stronghold in the shadow of New York City. To Maria Russo, the woman pouring the drinks, the reasons behind Trump’s win were as clear in the runup to the election as the shot glasses lined up on the high-top tables. A mother raising two kids on her own in Passaic County on a barkeep’s income, she saw it not just in light of her own situation but those of the people around her. “Anybody can see what’s going on, you know? The prices of everything. And me being a single mom?” she said.

Conservative lawmakers in the Polish parliament exulted at Donald Trump’s victory, standing and applauding while they chanted his name. The prospect of a second Trump term has excited people on the populist right across Central Europe who share his anti-immigrant views and contempt for international organizations. But many others in a region near the war in Ukraine are afraid. They worry Trump could abandon Ukraine and force Kyiv into a deal that ends up emboldening Russia further, or unwind the U.S. military presence in Europe.

Three daughters of Malcolm X have accused the CIA, FBI, the New York Police Department and others in a $100 million lawsuit Friday of playing roles in the 1965 assassination of the civil rights leader. In the lawsuit filed in Manhattan federal court, the daughters — along with the Malcolm X estate — claimed that the agencies were aware of and were involved in the assassination plot and failed to stop the killing. At a morning news conference, attorney Ben Crump stood with family members as he described the lawsuit, saying he hoped federal and city officials would read it “and learn all the dastardly deeds that were done by their predecessors and try to right these historic wrongs.” The NYPD and CIA did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Over the past two weeks, the political landscape around the negotiations for a cease-fire in Gaza have undergone a dramatic transformation. The American elections, the firing of Israel’s popular defense minister, Qatar’s decision to suspend its mediation, and the ongoing war in Lebanon all seem to have pushed the possibility for a cease-fire in Gaza further away than it has been in more than a year of conflict. Still, some families of the dozens of hostages who remain captive in Gaza are desperately hoping the changes will reignite momentum to bring their loved ones home — though the impact of Donald Trump returning to the White House and a hard-line new defense minister in Israel remains unknown.

Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party’s prodigious fundraising operation raised more than $1 billion in her loss to Donald Trump, but the vice president is still pushing donors for more money after the election. Democrats are sending persistent appeals to Harris supporters without expressly asking them to cover any potential debts, enticing would-be donors instead with other matters: the Republican president-elect’s picks for his upcoming administration and a handful of pending congressional contests where ballots are still being tallied. “The Harris campaign certainly spent more than they raised and is now busy trying to fundraise,” said Adrian Hemond, a Democratic strategist from Michigan. He said he was been asked by the campaign after its loss to Trump to help with fundraising.