Mark Rutte, the NATO secretary general, said last week that he plans to call for alliance members to increase their military spending to 5 percent of their GDPs, which is a significant jump from the current 2 percent level amid what he sees as a growing risk of war with Russia.
The U.S. Federal Reserve’s latest Beige Book, a collection of anecdotes and snapshots of business conditions around the country, shows flat hiring, rising costs, and a contraction in the U.S. economy. “Economic activity has declined slightly since the previous report,” which was released on 23 April, the central bank said in a statement. ......
Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, called on Islamic countries in the Middle East to come together to defend the Palestinians in Gaza and restrain Israel’s Zionist regime from continuing “these barbaric actions” inside the enclave.
The U.S. vetoed a draft resolution in the UN Security Council last week that demanded a permanent ceasefire in Gaza that called the conditions inside the enclave “catastrophic,” requiring all humanitarian restrictions to be lifted.
Germany announced last week that it will continue to provide Israel with weapons, despite earlier criticism from its new conservative Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who said last month that Tel Aviv’s actions in Gaza “can no longer be justified as a fight against Hamas terrorism.”
The Israeli government last week refused a proposal from the Lebanese army that would allow the IDF to inspect locations in Beirut’s suburbs but said Tel Aviv refused the plan, which was floated a day after massive strikes on the city’s suburbs, which were called the most extensive since the November ceasefire.
Two pro-Zionists groups in London have “instrumentalized regulatory authorities” to crush anyone who comes out in favor of the Palestinian cause and against “Israel’s racist policies” in the region, according to a newly released report by CAGE International.
Volker Türk, the UN human rights chief, said last week that Israel’s continued effort to prevent food from reaching Palestinians trapped inside Gaza may constitute a war crime.
Luiz Inacio da Silva, the Brazilian president, said last week that Israel’s military action inside Gaza should not be classified as a war, but rather a “premeditated genocide” that is being executed by a “highly prepared army against women and children.”
Rev. Johnnie Moore, an evangelical Christian Zionist who has close ties to U.S. President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was tapped to lead the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which is the joint American-Israeli effort to go around the UN to distribute food and aid to Palestinians.