Banker wars

IMF chief outlines terms for more Ukraine funding

Kiev must end electricity and heating subsidies for the population, Kristalina Georgieva has said

Kiev must phase out electricity and heating subsidies and distribute the tax burden more fairly in order to get additional funding from the IMF, its head Kristalina Georgieva has said.

Ukraine is ranked among Europe’s poorest countries, and subsidies for electricity, heating, and gas have long maintained households. International lenders say continuing aid will require painful reforms, and that ordinary Ukrainians must bear part of the cost.

“We still have electricity and heating subsidized; they’re subsidized for a reason, we know why the country is doing it, but that has to go,” Georgieva said on Monday on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos.

“We still have work to be done in terms of fiscal position, we are right now looking into how we can make the burden sharing of taxation fairer and it’s not an easy thing but it has to be done,” the IMF chief said, describing those issues as an obstacle to private sector dynamism.

Ukraine relies heavily on Western aid to cover everything from military costs to pensions. The country’s backers have maintained financial support despite a major corruption scandal involving state nuclear operator, Energoatom, and longtime associates of Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky.

Kiev secured a $15.5 billion loan from the Washington-based institution three years ago, but that program ends in 2027. Last year, Ukrainian authorities reached an agreement on a new $8.2 billion package. At the time, the government pledged to tackle corruption, tighten fiscal discipline and push ahead with politically sensitive reforms, including cutting energy subsidies.

In October, Bloomberg reported citing sources familiar with the situation that the IMF had been pressuring Ukraine to devalue its currency, the hryvnia, in order to secure a new loan. The measure was reportedly seen as a way to ease the country’s financial strain by boosting budget revenues in local-currency terms. The IMF warned that Kiev faces a widening funding gap of around $136.5 billion for the 2026-2029 period.

https://www.rt.com/business/631207-imf-ukraine-electricity-heating-subsidies/

Bipartisan FY26 Minibus Released As January 30th Shutdown Approaches

It seems that Congress may bypass our regularly scheduled shutdown drama - as House appropriators released the text of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2026 early Monday, marking a significant step toward completing all 12 annual spending bills ahead of the January 30 funding deadline and averting another government shutdown. The package reflects a rare point of bipartisan convergence on topline funding - even as Republicans and Democrats frame the deal in sharply different political terms.

The legislation packages conference agreements covering Defense; Labor, Health and Human Services and Education; Transportation, Housing and Urban Development; and Homeland Security, though GOP leaders have committed to moving the Homeland bill separately. Together, the three-bill minibus released Monday totals roughly $1.2 trillion in discretionary spending, according to Democratic appropriators.

Punchbowl News' John Bresnahan has summarized a few key provisions:

FEMA gets a big increase, $4.7 billion.

$28 billion-plus for ICE & CPB. This includes nearly $4B for “custody operations to bolster the Trump Administration’s efforts to detain and deport all criminal and removable aliens.”

$744 million in Homeland Security bill for “the transportation and removal of every alien who no longer has a legal basis to remain in this country.”

$2.6B for Homeland Security Investigations

$273 million in earmarks in FEMA

Keeps in place HUD layoffs, about 24% of staff.

$3.8 billion in earmarks in THUD bill

Republicans on the House Appropriations Committee cast the agreement as proof that Congress can complete its work without relying on year-end omnibus packages. Chairman Tom Cole said the deal reflects “a deliberate, member-driven process” that delivers full-year funding aligned with the Trump administration’s priorities while keeping spending below levels projected under the current continuing resolution.

“America has always been a nation of builders,” Cole said, arguing the bills reinforce military readiness, border security, education, health systems and transportation infrastructure while applying fiscal discipline. GOP leaders emphasized that the measures were negotiated on a bipartisan, bicameral basis and described the package as advancing an “America First” agenda centered on defense, innovation and domestic security.

The Defense title includes funding increases for military pay, investments in weapons systems and industrial supply chains, and research and development accounts aimed at accelerating next-generation capabilities. Homeland Security provisions emphasize enforcement, border operations and emergency preparedness, while maintaining longstanding riders barring housing assistance for undocumented immigrants and preserving restrictions related to abortion and livestock transportation.

Labor-HHS-Education funding, according to Republicans, prioritizes biomedical research, workforce training and rural health care, while Transportation and Housing provisions focus on air traffic control modernization, infrastructure safety and economic development assistance for local communities.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/bipartisan-fy26-minibus-released-january-30th-shutdown-approaches

"The US Is Basically Not A Good Credit": Danish Pension Fund To Sell US Treasuries

Over the weekend, Deutsche Bank's head of FX George Saravelos laid out one theoretical reason why in his view, Europe has leverage over the US in the latest burst of transatlatnic tensions over Greenland: or rather $8 trillion reasons why the US has leverage.

As Saravelos wrote, "European countries own $8 trillion of US bonds and equities, almost twice as much as the rest of the world combined" and added that in an environment where the geoeconomic stability of the western alliance is being disrupted existentially, "it is not clear why Europeans would be as willing to play this part. Danish pension funds were one of the first to repatriate money and reduce their dollar exposure this time last year. With USD exposure still very elevated across Europe, developments over the last few days have potential to further encourage dollar rebalancing."

Sure enough, just hours later, Europe appears to have taken the Deutsche Bank strategist's advice and contrary to Scott Bessent's appeals this morning that European governments aggressively selling American debt to counter Washington's threats over Greenland, would "defy logic", Bloomberg has reported that the Danish pension fund AkademikerPension is planning to exit US Treasuries by the end of the month, amid concerns that the policies of President Donald Trump have created credit risks too big to ignore.

“The US is basically not a good credit and long-term the US government finances are not sustainable,” Anders Schelde, chief investment officer at AkademikerPension, told Bloomberg on Tuesday, which is hilarious because this has been the case for years if not decades. Amusingly, it was another Dane, Hans Christian Andersen, who first pointed out that the Emperor is naked. Two hundred years later, Denmark has done it again.

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/us-basically-not-good-credit-danish-pension-fund-sell-us-treasuries

Michelle Obama Urges People to Be ‘Mindful’ of Buying’ White Owned Clothes Brands

https://twitter.com/i/status/2013356579802767412

Federal auditors identified nearly $1.4 billion owed back to U.S. taxpayers, with California alone accounting for the overwhelming majority:

California: ~$1.3 billion

New York: ~$30.7 million

Illinois: ~$29.8 million

Minnesota: ~$12.7 million

Oregon: ~$5.4 million

Washington: ~$2.3 million

Washington, D.C.: ~$2.1 million

Colorado: ~$1.5 million

TOTAL: ~$1.394 billion

California must return more than $1 billion to the federal government after an audit by @DrOzCMS and his team uncovered federal dollars being spent on healthcare for illegal immigrants. We are teaming up to combat healthcare fraud so the money can be used for American citizens

https://twitter.com/i/status/2013360442626973796

NATO preparing for war against Russia – Lavrov

European leaders are not even trying to hide the fact that they want a direct conflict with Moscow, the foreign minister has said

Speaking at a press conference on the results of Russian diplomatic activities in 2025, Lavrov pointed to remarks by the EU’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, and other politicians such as European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and the leaders of Germany, France, and the UK. “They are seriously preparing for war against the Russian Federation, and, in fact, are not even hiding it.”

The foreign minister added that while Russia is determined to “eliminate the root causes” of the Ukraine conflict, it is the West that has been “deliberately creating” these issues for many years in an effort to turn Ukraine into a “threat to Russia’s security.”

He noted that although the goal of inflicting a “strategic defeat” on Moscow is not expressed by Western leaders as often these days, their actions suggest that the idea is still alive in their “minds and plans,” pointing to the continued support of the “openly Nazi regime” in Kiev and its course for the “legislative and physical extermination of everything Russian.”

Russia has rejected Western claims that it poses a threat to any foreign countries, dismissing it as “nonsense” and fearmongering meant to justify inflated military budgets across Europe.

Nevertheless, Poland, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia have continued to push the claims and recently withdrew from international treaties banning anti-personnel landmines, and have announced plans to produce and deploy them along their borders with Russia.

https://www.rt.com/news/631196-lavrov-nato-russia-war/

OBAMA’S HIDDEN FOREIGN ELECTION NETWORK: The Radical Foreign Groups That Helped Elect Obama and Whose Remnants Remain a DNC Tent Pole

Peter Schweizer exposes how radical foreign groups helped elect former President Barack Obama in 2008 and how this network remains a part of the Democratic Party machine today.

Schweizer focuses on one group in particular, the radical Salvadoran political party, Farabundo Martí National Liberation (FMLN) Front, which evolved into a party after beginning as a Marxist guerrilla group in El Salvador.

Thousands of immigrants linked to foreign radical movements, including the FMLN, “staked out important positions in American labor unions and became involved in American political campaigns, whether they were US citizens or not,” beginning in the early 2000s, Schweizer details.

He cites Dr. Arpi Misha Miller’s “sympathetic account” of the group staking a footprint in the United States political sphere in her 2013 PhD dissertation “Reconciling Americas: Salvadoran Immigrant Activists and Political Transnationalism,” at the University of California. Miller notably went on to become director of ISAAC of Northern Colorado, a nonprofit that describes itself as being “committed to equity, empowerment & justice” on its Facebook page.

Miller noted in her 2013 dissertation that FMLN activists “gained additional experience on the ground in community and labor organizing, as lead organizers with powerful” groups including AFSCME, Change to Win, OneLA, and the SEIU, between 2004 and 2009.

The activists aided in Obama’s 2008 campaign “as individuals and through their work in unions” with some activists taking on organizing positions that were full-time paid jobs, according to Miller.

Schweizer writes that these radicals carried on the Marxist insurgency from El Salvador in their political work in America, bringing “their cause with them when they crossed the border.”

“For Barack Obama and other progressive leaders, mi casa es su casa, ideologically. No wonder that Obama welcomed these activists to work hard on his campaign and pressed to get them citizenship as quickly as possible, in that order,” Schweizer details.

During a November 2008 Los Angeles rally, an activist told Miller that the City of Angels “is a strategic city for El Salvador with 800 thousand or more Salvadoreños!” and that the campaign “started YEARS ago.”

“These radical foreign activists would not remain on the fringes,” Schweizer emphasizes in The Invisible Coup.

https://youtu.be/gGOohlBP4Kk

Insurrection Act Memo Is Making The Rounds At The White House

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A legal memorandum, authored by a group of retired military brass, is currently circulating within the White House, detailing the constitutional and legal justification for President Trump to invoke the Insurrection Act.

This exclusive report confirms the existence of the document, which outlines a systemic breakdown of law and order and cites specific rationales that demand immediate federal intervention to protect the constitutional rights of American citizens. The memo’s presence at the highest levels of government signals a grave and urgent consideration of extraordinary executive action

The Memo’s Core Mandate: Invoking the Insurrection Act

The memorandum, which sources confirm was penned by a coalition of retired military leaders, focuses on the necessity of federal authority to restore lawful order. It argues that the failure of state and local governments to protect federally secured rights has created a crisis demanding the President’s direct action.

The memo specifically details the reasons President Trump should invoke the Insurrection Act, citing rationales that include:

1. Systemic Failure of State Authorities: The refusal or inability of state and local officials to protect the constitutional rights of American citizens, particularly those who support federal authority.

1. Coordinated Obstruction of Federal Law Enforcement: A pattern of federal officers being obstructed, threatened, assaulted, and politically targeted while carrying out lawful duties.

1. Violence Against Private Citizens: Escalating violence and intimidation directed at private citizens, including in churches and public spaces, which state authorities fail to address.

The document warns that continued inaction risks normalizing selective enforcement of federal law, eroding public trust, and creating a durable precedent of state-level nullification that will destabilize governance going forward.

The Crisis of Nullification: Institutional Betrayal

The memo’s most damning indictment is the institutional betrayal by state and local authorities. In fact, this is not mere incompetence; it is a deliberate refusal to uphold the foundational duty of government: to protect the innocent and secure the rights of the people. Therefore, the document frames the crisis as a moral one, where political expediency has replaced the defense of the individual soul and universal human dignity. Specifically, the memo presents the targeting of citizens in churches and public spaces as evidence of a breakdown so profound that only the highest executive authority can intervene.

In addition, this failure is actively creating a “durable precedent of state-level nullification.” This is a direct challenge to the supremacy of federal law and the very concept of a unified republic. As a result, the memo asserts that the current conditions represent a moral and constitutional emergency, where the fundamental principles of the nation are under assault not by foreign enemies, but by domestic authorities who have abandoned their oaths. Ultimately, the retired military brass, viewing the situation through a lens of national security, demand that the executive branch confront this internal threat with the full weight of its constitutional power.

https://rumble.com/embed/v72e06y/?pub=4

Let’s Make Child Porn Less Punishable, And Other Fun Ideas From Newly Empowered Virginia Democrats

“They will do this nationally as soon as they gain power and democracy will end,” Elon Musk tweeted yesterday.

He was referring to the wave of proposed legislation that has hit Virginia since Democrats took a trifecta in the state all of a week ago. It’s hard to put into words what the Democrat vision is, but I’ll give it a shot.

In short, their platform appears to be:

Punish crime less

Punish police more

Punish police more

Free stuff for illegal immigrants

Let’s clone Minnesota Somali daycare fraud

Commence gaying up the children

Tax everything. Tax gas, tax tips and meals, tax guns.

On guns, let’s ban them. Also, let’s require special gun IDs for ownership

Forget counting votes, ban that too

While we’re on the subject, let’s do voting on the “internet”

Ban white men from securing government contracts

Re-hire everyone DOGE fired

Gerrymander the GOP into a permanent minority to “resist Trump”

And much, much more!

My descriptions might be in the vernacular, but they’re not hyperbolic. Read the text of these bills. I’m not making any of this up and trust me, I wish I were.

I described it yesterday as an orgy of destruction, and that’s exactly what it is. It’ll destroy Virginia, and if we let it happen, they’ll export it nationally the next chance they get.

The tweet Musk was replying to put it best.

“While conservatives were bleating ‘if we fight dirty, we’re no better than them,’ it took Democrats less than 24 hours after winning to put in express lanes to Sodom and Gomorrah.”

Think that’s over the top? Just look at these edits on mandatory minimum sentences in House Bill 863, which was filed Jan. 13, four days before Democrat Abigail Spanberger was sworn in as governor.

Hey, guys, let’s make rape less punishable!

https://dailycaller.com/2026/01/20/ingersoll-virginia-democrats-abigail-spanberger-mandatory-minimums-sexual-offenses/

‘Achieving The Panopticon’: UK Police Forces to Trial Minority Report-Style AI Predictive Policing

British police forces are planning to trial Artificial Intelligence schemes to predict and target potential criminals before an offence has been committed.

Sir Andy Marsh, the head of the College of Policing, which sets and maintains national standards, said that there are currently around 100 projects in which Artificial Intelligence is being trialled by police forces across the country, including to reduce manpower hours spent on menial tasks such as paperwork.

However, the initiative also includes “predictive analytics” schemes to target supposedly future criminals before they commit a crime, in what has been likened to the 1956 sci-fi classic novel The Minority Report by Philip K. Dick — later adapted to film in 2002 by Stephen Spielberg– in which a group of mutants with predictive powers are tasked with aiding the police to carry out “pre-crime” arrests against people who will supposedly commit a crime in the future.

According to a report from The Telegraph, the UK government has committed £4 million ($5.4m) to create an “interactive AI-driven map” of Britain that hopes to be able to point out crimes before they happen by 2030. Another are of use would be to spot the early indications of fights or other anti-social behaviour to allow police to prevent it from escalating or to deploy police in areas likely to see a knife crime offence.

Marsh said that such predictive policing could also be applied to identify the men who pose the greatest threat to women and girls, saying: “We know the data and case histories tell us that, unfortunately, it’s far from uncommon for these individuals to move from one female victim to another, and we understand all of the difficulties of bringing successful cases to bear in court.”

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, who has been a leading force behind the nationwide expansion of live police facial recognition cameras, reportedly said she wanted to transform surveillance in Britain with the help of AI so that “the eyes of the state can be on you at all times.”

Incredibly, it is stated Mahmood even favourably compared her idea to the Panopticon, a Georgian super-prison concept used by Foucault to “illustrate the proclivity of disciplinary societies subjugate its citizens”.

Speaking to the Tony Blair Institute and Tony Blair himself, she is reported to have remarked: “When I was in justice, my ultimate vision for that part of the criminal justice system was to achieve, by means of AI and technology, what Jeremy Bentham tried to do with his Panopticon. That is that the eyes of the state can be on you at all times… I think there’s big space here for being able to harness the power of AI and tech to get ahead of the criminals, frankly, which is what we’re trying to do.”

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2026/01/20/uk-police-forces-to-trial-minority-report-style-ai-predictive-policing/

Trump Threatens 200% Tariffs as France Declines To Join Board of Peace

Tariffs would target French wines and champagnes

President Donald Trump has threatened to hit French wine and champagne with a 200 percent tariff after France signaled it would not join his proposed “Board of Peace” for Gaza. “I’ll put a 200 percent tariff on his wines and champagnes, and he’ll join, but he doesn’t have to join,” he told reporters. France’s agriculture minister Annie Genevard called the threat “blackmail” and said it was shocking because it sought to force compliance. A senior French official said Paris does not intend to join the board because its charter extends beyond Gaza and could undermine the United Nations.

According to a Bloomberg report, nations seeking a permanent seat must pledge at least $1 billion, and the board’s charter says the three‑year term doesn’t apply to members that contribute more than $1 billion in the first year. Sources say more than ten countries have already signed on, though it’s still unclear which nations are being asked to pay the fee or which have actually agreed to do so.

The Trump administration unveiled the Board of Peace last week as part of its blueprint to oversee the Gaza cease-fire and reconstruction. The Board would supervise Gaza’s demilitarization and reconstruction under a 20‑point plan announced by the White House. It is structured as a three‑tier panel chaired by Trump and would elevate U.S. and European figures such as Secretary of State Marco Rubio and former British prime minister Tony Blair, while Palestinians would be relegated to municipal positions. Moscow confirmed that President Vladimir Putin had been invited and was seeking clarification. Israel has also received an invitation but has not publicly committed. Critics argue that including states engaged in active conflicts while excluding Palestinian leaders undermines the board’s credibility and risks entrenching Western and Israeli interests.

Trump’s tariff threat is part of a pattern. Earlier this month he wrote to Norway’s prime minister to complain about being passed over for the Nobel Peace Prize, saying he would no longer feel obliged to “think purely of peace” and that the world is not secure unless the United States controls Greenland. He argued Denmark could not defend the island and, when several European nations objected to his plans, slapped a 10 percent tariff on their exports and warned the levy would rise if they did not relent.

Using trade pressure to coerce partners risks economic blowback. A 200 percent tariff would effectively price French wine out of the U.S. market and could prompt retaliatory measures. European ministers have warned they will not be blackmailed and have discussed deploying anti‑coercion tools. France’s refusal to join the board therefore pits Washington’s unilateralism against a Europe intent on protecting multilateral institutions. As trade threats mount and crises from Gaza to Greenland remain unresolved, Trump’s “Board of Peace” faces skepticism even before its first meeting.

https://news.antiwar.com/2026/01/20/trump-threatens-200-tariffs-as-france-declines-to-join-board-of-peace/

The Private Companies Quietly Building a Police State

From Palantir’s data fusion to Clearview’s face scraping and Flock’s license-plate dragnets, a handful of private vendors now underpin everyday policing—and ICE’s deportation machine. Sold as “public safety,” these tools supercharge surveillance, stitch together vast personal data, and evade democratic oversight. Here’s what they are, who profits, and how we can shrink police reliance on them.

Donald Trump entered the White House last January with a promise to carry out the largest mass deportation in United States history. While Trump hasn’t made history with the numbers, his administration’s policies have led to a dramatic surge in ICE arrests, fueled in part by private technology companies that have made them possible.

Powerful tools that collect and aggregate data, enable facial recognition, and increase surveillance have become a bedrock of American policing over the past two decades. In collaboration with private technology companies, law enforcement agencies at all levels have experimented with how to implement these tools and created a large consumer market for them. Against this backdrop, it is essential to understand the role of the tech industry in both increasing the reach of local law enforcement and enabling mass deportations by the Trump administration.

The Trump administration has made a public show of its deportation efforts, but the technologies that make it possible have received less attention. ICE is, for example, one of the largest customers for Clearview AI, a facial recognition company that has scraped more than 30 billion faces from internet sources. Data brokers, including one owned jointly by several airline companies, are actively selling data to ICE and other federal agencies. Perhaps most noteworthy is a new $30 million contract between ICE and Palantir to build a platform integrating data from myriad sources to provide “near real-time visibility” of migrants in the country.

Palantir is a defense contractor that builds data integration tools for law enforcement and government agencies–what one former employee describes as “really extravagant plumbing with data.” While the company brands itself as a neutral “data infrastructure” provider, Palantir is in reality a largely unchecked force in the expansion of mass surveillance. For example, the company is in conversation with the Trump administration to build and manage systems for the Social Security Administration and the IRS, a move challenged by civil rights groups. Palantir’s “plumbing” could lay the foundation for which law enforcement agencies leverage massive troves of private information never intended for police use. Such systems have been used on a smaller scale for years in local police agencies, enabling mass surveillance and, in many cases, exacerbating racist policing.

The surveillance technologies currently used by ICE empower the agency in ways that are both unprecedented and massively expand its reach. But they are also in use far beyond this one agency. Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital privacy organization, has mapped a wide range of intrusive technology systems – from surveillance cameras to complex systems like Palantir’s – used by local police agencies throughout the country. Hundreds of companies, many of which began as military and defense contractors, now market their tools to, and develop them in concert with, law enforcement agencies across the United States.

The significant role of private companies in police technology makes transparency and accountability increasingly difficult: proprietary algorithms are shielded by legal protections, contracts are negotiated outside of public view, and oversight bodies struggle to access or understand these systems. Lawmakers, meanwhile, struggle to keep pace with rapidly evolving technology. The privatization of policing infrastructure allows surveillance tools to proliferate without public scrutiny and operate beyond the reach of democratic governance and oversight.

more

https://campaignzero.org/the-private-companies-quietly-building-a-police-state/

Stephen Miller — Nations are not entitled to territories ‘they cannot defend.’ Miller makes the case for Greenland takeover.

Stephen Miller argues Greenland is central to the next era of polar competition, calling it a “raw and unfair deal” for America to defend a massive territory at full cost while Denmark keeps full control:

“Greenland is not essential for America’s national security. The new domain of international competition is going to be polar competition; that is where more and more resources are being spent by our nation’s adversaries. Greenland is 25% larger than Alaska. Greenland is the size of one-quarter of the continental United States. With respect to Denmark, Denmark is a tiny country with a tiny economy and a tiny military. They cannot defend Greenland. So they want us to spend hundreds of billions of dollars defending a territory for them that is 25% bigger than Alaska at a hundred percent American expense, but they say while we do this, it belongs 100% to Denmark. It’s a raw deal. It’s an unfair deal.”

https://twitter.com/i/status/2012360501347360801

High Court nixes autopsies of babies found dead at daycare as Haredim riot in protest

Elderly man assaulted as ultra-Orthodox rage against ‘desecration’ of infants who died at unlicensed Jerusalem daycare; teen protester run over blocking road, is moderately injured

The High Court of Justice ruled Tuesday that autopsies will not be performed on the two infants who died a day earlier in an unlicensed, overcrowded Jerusalem daycare facility, as ultra-Orthodox riots erupted in protest of the postmortems.

The court held a hearing on the petition Tuesday afternoon filed by the ultra-Orthodox ZAKA emergency service on behalf of the deceased infants’ families. The hearing included a phone call with the head of the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute, Dr. Chen Kugel, during a closed-door section of the proceedings.

The court ruled that an autopsy was not necessary if all other required tests, including needle-based procedures not involving surgery, were completed, and that the infants could be buried without further delay.

The ruling, issued by justices Alex Stein, Yechiel Kasher, and Ruth Ronen, overturned a decision by the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court to allow the autopsies, which law enforcement authorities had requested to determine the cause of death.

The families are ultra-Orthodox and opposed the autopsies on religious grounds. Jewish law in general proscribes autopsies because the human body is sacred and thus should not be tampered with after death, and urges that funerals be held as quickly as possible after a person dies. However, Jewish law does permit autopsies in some situations involving saving another life.

Dror Shoshim, the attorney who represented the families in court, described the ruling as “an important decision demonstrating humane sensitivity and respect for the dead,” according to a statement from Zaka.

Police and the State Attorney’s Office had pushed for the autopsies to uncover the exact cause of death for 4-month-old Leah Goloventzitz and 6-month-old Aharon Katz, whose bodies were found on Monday morning, along with 53 other babies and toddlers with varying degrees of injuries at the overcrowded Haredi daycare center in Jerusalem’s Romema neighborhood.

Police reportedly believe the two babies may have died of heat exhaustion and dehydration linked to a faulty heating system in the daycare, but are looking to confirm their suspicions with forensic medical procedures.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/high-court-nixes-autopsies-of-babies-found-dead-at-daycare-as-haredim-riot-in-protest/

This is Israel

Police scrap appointment of man with history of anti-LGBTQ incitement, race crimes

Rahamim Hugi had been tapped to serve as head of the police force’s new ultra-Orthodox enlistment directorate, with a rank of chief superintendent

Israel Police Commissioner Daniel Levy ordered on Tuesday the cancellation of a senior appointment within the force for an enlistment officer, after it was reported that the appointee, Rahamim Hugi, had called for violence against the LGBTQ community and had a criminal record that includes assault and race-based crimes.

Hugi had been slated to head the Israel Police’s new ultra-Orthodox enlistment department, but the Aguda LGBTQ umbrella organization said on Tuesday that it had received word from Levy that the appointment would not be moving forward. A police spokesperson later confirmed to The Times of Israel that the offer had been rescinded.

Levy’s about-face came after the i24 news outlet reported on Monday evening that Hugi had been confirmed as head of the police’s new ultra-Orthodox enlistment directorate, with a rank of chief superintendent.

The outlet first reported on the police chief’s plan to appoint Hugi in November, although it did not identify him by name at the time, saying only that a man accused of racist and anti-LGBTQ incitement was in the running to become the police’s new ultra-Orthodox enlistment czar. At the time, the candidate was said to be the favorite of far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s inner circle.

He is currently employed in the IDF’s ultra-Orthodox enlistment division, according to Channel 12.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/police-scrap-appointment-of-man-with-history-of-anti-lgbtq-incitement-race-crimes/

Banks are blocking metals purchases

https://twitter.com/i/status/2012298456778383570

Wait. So, Texas has the 2nd highest level of undocumented immigrants. Why isn’t ICE there?

The chart matches a CBS News analysis of ICE data from Jan 20 to June 27, 2025, obtained via the Deportation Data Project. Texas led with 23.2% of arrests, countering claims of low ICE presence there.

https://citizenwathreport.com/wait-so-texas-has-the-2nd-highest-level-of-undocumented-immigrants-why-isnt-ice-there/

How did South Park see this coming 16 years ago?

https://twitter.com/i/status/2012175037055357325

>>24149244

https://twitter.com/i/status/2012211302236590477

World Jewish Congress President Ronald Lauder involved in Trump’s push for Greenland - report

Since Trump’s first term, Lauder has, according to the Guardian, acquired commercial holdings in Greenland. Some analysts see his suggestion to Trump as a way to personally benefit.

World Jewish Congress President and longtime friend of US President Donald Trump, Ronald Lauder, may have helped spark Trump’s interest in acquiring Greenland, according to a new report in The Guardian on Thursday.

Former national security adviser John Bolton, who left the first Trump administration in 2019, told the British newspaper that Trump summoned him to the Oval Office and said that a billionaire, later identified as Lauder, had proposed that the United States buy Greenland.

According to Bolton, Trump's close friends hold sway over the president’s actions. “Bits of information that he hears from friends, he takes them as truth, and you can’t shake his opinion,” he told the Guardian.

Lauder’s relationship with Trump stretches back decades to the 1960s, and the businessman has donated extensively to conservative political campaigns, including a $5 million donation to a pro-Trump super PAC.

Since floating the idea during Trump’s first term, Lauder has, according to the Guardian, acquired commercial holdings in Greenland, and some analysts see his suggestion to Trump as a way to personally benefit.

Lauder even wrote an op-ed in the New York Post calling for the Danish territory to “achieve its dream of independence” by “secur[ing] its economy and defenses” with the help of the US. In the article, Lauder dubbed Greenland “America’s next frontier,” arguing that the Arctic should achieve its full potential with help from Trump.

Lauder linked to ventures overlapping with US foreign policy

Lauder has previously been linked to business ventures overlapping with US foreign policy. Earlier this month, The New York Times reported that Ukraine awarded a consortium including Lauder a contract to mine a major lithium deposit, worth at least hundreds of millions of dollars.

Lauder is a prominent Jewish leader and a longtime advocate for Israel. He has served as president of the World Jewish Congress since 2007 and has been deeply involved in supporting Jewish communities worldwide.

He has funded numerous pro-Israel initiatives and cultural programs, and his work in diplomacy and philanthropy has made him a major figure in global Jewish affairs.

https://www.jpost.com/international/article-883900