Israel on Thursday pressed forward on plans for 4,400 homes in the Shomron, making 2020 one of the most prolific years for construction of new building units in Yehudah and Shomron. It is the first announcement of planned construction of homes in the Shomron since Israel suspended its annexation plans as part of the peace agreement with the United Arab Emirates. The Civil Administration’s High Planning Subcommittee is convening on Monday to finalize approval for about 2,500 units, with the remaining units receiving initial approval at the meeting. According to the council, 952 new housing units will be built in Har Gilo, 629 units in Eli, 357 in Geva Binyamin, 354 in Nili, and 346 in Beit El.

Raymond McGuire, a longtime Wall Street executive, has entered the race to be the next mayor of New York City. McGuire, 63, told clients and colleagues at Citigroup, where he is a vice chairman, that he was leaving to focus on the 2021 mayor’s race, The New York Times reported Thursday. If elected, he would be the city’s second Black mayor, and would be leading a city economically battered by the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. “New York gave me the opportunity to be enormously successful,” he told The Times. “Now New York is in a financial crisis that has exploded into a whole bunch of crises — educational, health and criminal justice.

It was the hug that may define — or doom — a long Senate career. Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California embraced Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham at the close of confirmation hearings Thursday for President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett, publicly thanking the chairman for a job well done. Senator @LindseyGrahamSC and @SenFeinstein shake hands and hug after the #SCOTUShearings conclude. Full video here: https://t.co/lKxfaDOIaZ pic.twitter.com/rj1diSUxAQ — CSPAN (@cspan) October 15, 2020 “This has been one of the best set of hearings that I’ve participated in,” Feinstein said at the Senate Judiciary Committee. Calls for her ouster from Democratic leadership were swift, unequivocal and relentless. “It’s time for Sen.

When Brazilian history professor Wandercy Pugliesi’s swastika pool was discovered in 2014, it made headlines. Pugliesi, 58, who a son named Adolf, had a huge swastika symbol tiled into his outdoor pool. In 1994, police seized a collection of Nazi-related material from his home. Pugliesi’s name made it back in the headlines in recent weeks due to his running for a seat on his local town council, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) reported. Unfortunately for him, the infamy of his swastika pool preceded him and The Liberal Party booted him out last week, “for not ideologically agreeing with the affiliate.” Pugliesi lives in a rural area in the state of Santa Catarina, where many German immigrants and their descendants live and neo-Nazi incidents have occurred more than once.

Thousands of people in wine country were without power Thursday amid a fall heat wave that brought another round of extreme wildfire danger to large portions of already battered Northern California. Pacific Gas and Electric cut power starting Wednesday evening to more than 45,000 customers — about 100,000 people — mainly in the Sierra Nevada foothills and the San Francisco Bay Area. Some restorations began Thursday afternoon, and by evening the number of customers without power was about 30,000, the utility said. All power was expected to be restored by Friday night. Many in wine country north of San Francisco were feeling drained by what seems like a never-ending wildfire season in the region.

Richard Holzer, 28, pleaded guilty today to federal hate crime and explosives charges for plotting to blow up the Temple Emanuel Synagogue in Pueblo, Colorado. Holzer pleaded guilty to intentionally attempting to obstruct persons in the enjoyment of their free exercise of religious beliefs, through force and the attempted use of explosives and fire, in violation of Title 18, U.S. Code, Section 247, and with attempting to maliciously damage and destroy, by means of fire and explosives, a building used in interstate commerce, in violation of Title 18 U.S. Code, Section 844(i). “The defendant attempted to bomb the Temple Emanuel Synagogue to drive people of Jewish faith out of his community,” said Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband of the Civil Rights Division.

The cities of Oakland and Portland, Oregon have sued the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department, alleging that the agencies are overstepping constitutional limits in their use of federal law enforcement officers to tamp down on protests. The lawsuit, filed late Wednesday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, cites the deployment of U.S. agents this summer to quell protests in Portland and alleges the U.S. Marshals Service unlawfully deputized dozens of local Portland police officers as federal agents despite objections from city officials. The federal deputations have meant protesters arrested by local police could face federal charges, which generally carry stiffer penalties.

Republican megadonor Sheldon Adelson and his wife have given $75 million to a new super PAC that is attacking Democratic nominee Joe Biden, an investment made amid GOP concern that President Donald Trump’s campaign is flailing and might not be able to correct course. The money from the couple has been the driving force behind a more than $76 million attack campaign against Biden by the group Preserve America, which launched in August. It is run by Chris LaCivita, the strategist behind the 2004 Swift Boat Veterans for the Truth campaign, which helped tank then-Democratic nominee John Kerry’s bid with misleading ads that questioned his record in the Vietnam War.

A man took to the side of The New York Times headquarters on Thursday, climbing several stories before police got him inside and into custody. The New York Police Department said it happened shortly after 5 p.m., when the man started scaling the south side of the building, which is in midtown Manhattan near Times Square, across the street from the Port Authority bus terminal. The NYPD said officers apprehended the man, who has not been identified, from inside on the sixth floor. Video showed man waiting as officers cut or broke part of a window, then pulled him in. The 52-story building has been the target of climbers before. In 2011, a man climbed up five stories before coming back down. Three men made the attempt in 2008, two making it to the roof and one to the 11th floor. (AP)

Confronted with its first known coronavirus scare, Joe Biden’s presidential campaign turned the threat into another contrast with President Donald Trump in the closing weeks of a general election battle dominated by how the Republican incumbent has handled the pandemic and his own COVID-19 diagnosis. According to Biden’s campaign manager, Jen O’Malley Dillon, the campaign learned late Wednesday that two people associated with the operation had tested positive for the coronavirus. By 10 a.m. Thursday, O’Malley Dillon had publicly identified a top aide to vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris as having contracted the virus and confirmed that the campaign would suspend travel temporarily for the California senator and her husband, Doug Emhoff.