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March 21, 2017 at 5:43 pm
Hundreds of relatives of those killed on Sept. 11 have sued Saudi Arabia, joining many others who have tried to hold the kingdom responsible for the attacks.
Like other recent actions, the lawsuit filed Monday capitalizes on last year’s decision by Congress to let victims sue Saudi Arabia. It seeks unspecified damages.
Earlier attempts to hold Saudi Arabia responsible over the past 15 years have failed. Fifteen of the 19 attackers who hijacked planes to carry out the attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania were Saudis.
The 9/11 Commission report found “no evidence that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials individually funded” the attacks. But the commission also said there’s a “likelihood” that Saudi-government-spo...
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March 21, 2017 at 5:43 pm
Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch batted away Democrats’ efforts Tuesday to get him to reveal his views on abortion, guns and other controversial issues, insisting he keeps “an open mind for the entire process” when he issues rulings.
Gorsuch answered both friendly questions from majority Republicans and more probing questions from Democrats the same way, maintaining what he described as a rigid neutrality that is required of a judge.
“My personal views, I tell you, Mr. Chairman, are over here. I leave those at home,” Gorsuch said in response to a question from Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley of Iowa.
Questioned by Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California about the Supreme Court’s 2008 ruling affirming the right of people to keep gu...
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March 21, 2017 at 5:42 pm
Former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara is joining the New York University School of Law.
The school announced the addition Tuesday, 10 days after Bharara was fired by President Donald Trump after refusing to resign along with 45 other prosecutors appointed by the previous administration.
In a tweet, Bharara calls the new job one way he plans to keep working hard on important issues he cares about. He starts April 1 as a distinguished scholar in residence.
Bharara was appointed as U.S. attorney in Manhattan in 2009 by President Barack Obama.
Bharara says in a statement issued by NYU that he’s thrilled he’ll be addressing issues including criminal and social justice, honest government, national security, civil rights and corporate accountability.
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March 21, 2017 at 5:32 pm
It’s well known in Washington that politics is a lethal sport. Personal attacks, smear campaigns and character assassinations are too often the order of the day. But occasionally things go a step too far, even for Washington.
That’s been the case for the attacks exhibited against Sebastian Gorka recently published at The Forward.
The decision by The Forward to publish an article that sinks to the level of guilt by association and scurrilously unproven accusations of antisemitism is detrimental, both to a good man’s name and to the cause of fighting antisemitism.
I have had the pleasure of meeting and working with both Sebastian and his wife, Katie, whom I have found to be strong supporters of Israel and the Jewish people’s strug...
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March 21, 2017 at 5:25 pm
New York - U.S. stocks had their biggest drop in six months, led by declines in banks.
Financial companies, which soared in the months since the U.S. presidential election, fell sharply Tuesday.
Bank of America sank 5.8 percent, while JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo each lost about 3 percent.
A drop in bond yields helped push financial stocks lower. Lower yields mean lower interest rates on mortgages and other kinds of loans.
Industrial companies and transportation stocks also fell. United Continental dropped 3.3 percent.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 index lost 29 points, or 1.2 percent, to 2,344.
The Dow Jones industrial average fell 237 points, or 1.1 percent, to 20,668. The Nasdaq composite dropped 107 points, or 1.8 percent, to 5,793.
Small-company stocks fell more than th...
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March 21, 2017 at 5:25 pm
Jerusalem - A prominent Palestinian cartographer says he used a tool of his trade, a map, to explain to Israeli authorities they shouldn’t have closed his office on the outskirts of Jerusalem last week.
Israel issued a six-month closure order on grounds that Khalil Tufagji operated illegally from Jerusalem for the Palestinian self-rule government. Tufagji said Tuesday that he showed officers questioning him that his office is in the West Bank, meters from the municipal boundaries Israel drew in 1967 after capturing and annexing east Jerusalem.
He says the officers acknowledged their error. Tufagji’s office has reopened. He denies working for the Palestinian Authority.
Israeli officials did not respond to requests for comment Tuesday.
The Palestinians seek east Jerusalem as ...
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March 21, 2017 at 5:24 pm
Since US President Donald Trump took office two months ago, the Iranian regime has been feeling “besieged and under an emerging existential threat,” three Mideast experts wrote on Monday.
In an analysis published by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), A. Savyon, Yigal Carmon and U. Kafash said the Islamic Republic was facing a “new reality.”
“On the one hand,” they said, “the US is acting to organize the Gulf countries and Arab countries into an arrangement that Arab media have dubbed an ‘Arab NATO’ which is aimed against Iran. On the other hand, Iran senses that despite the Iran-Russia cooperation in recent years and in various areas, Russia is abandoning it for its other vital interests, such as an under...
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March 21, 2017 at 5:08 pm
Brooklyn, NY - Two and a half weeks after a pair of thieves walked out of a Williamsburg store with $4,400 worth of stolen diamond jewelry, the NYPD is releasing surveillance video of the incident in the hopes that someone will be able to help them identify the suspects.
The robbery took place somewhere between 12 and 1 PM on March 2nd at Chasuna Plaza on Rutledge Street in Williamsburg, a store that sells a variety of wedding related items including jewelry, furniture, linens and silver.
The owner of Chasuna Plaza, who agreed to be interviewed only on condition of anonymity, said that the couple came into the store and told sales people that they were looking for furniture. The couple, who appeared to be in their sixties and were dressed as Orthodox Jews, wandered through the stor...
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March 21, 2017 at 5:02 pm
The Baltimore City Council has approved raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2022.
The vote was 11-3.
Maryland's current minimum wage is $8.75. The bill would raise the minimum wage in the city gradually to reach $15 an hour by 2022, although businesses with fewer than 50 employees would have until 2026 to phase in the increase. The increase wouldn't apply to employees younger than 21.
Once the minimum wage hits $15, it will be increased by the city Wage Commission based on inflation.
"More income tax for the city," said Ricara Jones, chair of the Fight for $15 Coalition. It means it's going to increase home ownership, which mean more property tax for the city. Folks are going to have more money to spend at businesses."
Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke, the bill...
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March 21, 2017 at 4:27 pm
Israel has concluded that Hezbollah’s top military commander was killed in Syria last year by rivals within the Shiite terrorist group, Israel’s military chief said Tuesday.
The explosive announcement was the latest sign of an escalating feud between Israel and Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed group sworn to Israel’s destruction.
Israel considers Hezbollah to be a potent enemy, with over 100,000 rockets and missiles aimed at the Jewish state. But it also believes the group has been weakened and demoralized after years of fighting alongside President Bashar Assad’s forces in Syria.
Israel’s military chief, Lt. Gen. Gadi Eisenkot, told an academic conference on Tuesday that the death of Mustafa Badreddine last May illustrated “the depth of the internal cris...
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March 21, 2017 at 4:27 pm
An urgent petition was filed with the High Court of Justice seeking to have the court invalidate the plea bargain deal made with former Arab MK Basel Ghattas.
Ghattas will be facing a criminal indictment after it was established that he smuggled cellular telephones and other items to Arab terrorist imprisoned in Israel. He submitted his resignation from Knesset earlier this week, which has gone into effect, as part of a plea bargain agreement.
The petition was filed by former MK Dr. Michael Ben-Ari, who heads the Otzma Yehudit party along with Honenu attorney Itamar Ben-Givir, Baruch Marzel and Bentzion Gupstein of Lehava.
The petition calls on the court to issue an interim injunction prohibiting presenting the plea bargain on Wednesday, 24 Adar.
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March 21, 2017 at 3:57 pm
In the year since suicide bombings ripped through the Brussels airport and subway, those affected have found themselves fighting to be recognized as victims, battling for compensation, and dealing with insurance bureaucracy like seeking three price estimates for a prosthetic limb.
The attacks killed 32 people and wounded more than 300; a year on, some 900 people now count themselves as victims and are seeking compensation. They include family members of those killed and wounded and people traumatized by the events of that day.
“We feel like we have to get down on our knees, those of us who still have them, to say ‘Help us,'” said Philippe Vansteenkiste, whose sister Fabienne was killed at Brussels Zaventem airport. He is now leading efforts to get the government to...
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March 21, 2017 at 3:55 pm
Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) on intel leaks, FBI Director James Comey’s testimony on Capitol Hill and President Trump’s claims Trump Tower was wiretapped by the Obama administration
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March 21, 2017 at 3:34 pm
City officials are dragging their heels on a politically-sensitive probe of whether Hasidic schools provide their students with a secular education, advocates charge.
The Department of Education launched a probe more than 18 months ago after advocates submitted a list of dozens of Orthodox Jewish schools that provide little or no English, math, social studies or science — most notably for boys in yeshivas.
But advocates say the probe is moving at a snail’s pace because Mayor de Blasio fears riling the powerful Hasidic community.
“There’s really no explanation to why the mayor would turn a blind eye other than the fear of upsetting this powerful bloc vote led by these powerful [Jewish] lobbyist groups,” Naftuli Moster, founder of the group Yaffed, tol...
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March 21, 2017 at 3:02 pm
Gaza City - The Islamic militant group Hamas has drafted a new political program it hopes will improve ties with neighboring Egypt and the West, and present a more moderate image that will help it get off Western terrorism lists.
The internationally isolated group, which has ruled the Gaza Strip for the past decade, characterizes itself in the manifesto as a Palestinian resistance movement against Israeli occupation, dropping references to holy war against Jews. It also raises the possibility of a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, lands Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war.
The document plays down ties to Hamas’ parent movement, the regional Muslim Brotherhood, which is being targeted by Egypt’s government as a terror organization.
How...
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March 21, 2017 at 3:01 pm
London - The U.S. and British governments, citing unspecified threats, are barring passengers on some international flights from mostly Middle Eastern and North African countries from bringing laptops, tablets, electronic games and other devices on board in carry-on bags.
Passengers flying to the United States from 10 airports in eight countries will be allowed only cellphones and smartphones in the passenger cabins, senior Trump administration officials said. Larger electronic items must be checked.
The British security rules will affect flights from six countries and will bar passengers from taking “any phones, laptops or tablets larger than a normal sized mobile or smartphone,” into the cabin.
The U.S. rules took effect Tuesday, and airlines will have until 3 a.m. EDT Sat...
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March 21, 2017 at 2:56 pm
Trenton, NJ - New Jersey will give up to $1 million in grants to religious institutions and other non-profit groups vulnerable to attacks in the wake of a spate of threats against Jewish organizations around the country, Governor Chris Christie said on Tuesday.
Organizations in nine New Jersey counties will be able to apply to the state’s Office of Homeland Security for grants of up to $50,000 each for security equipment if they can show they are “at high risk of terrorist attack,” Christie said in his announcement.
Christie, a Republican, cited a bomb threat against a Jewish community center in Cherry Hill, Camden County, last month, one of more than 100 such incidents tallied at Jewish community centers around the United States this year. The threats all turned ...
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March 21, 2017 at 2:53 pm
Jerusalem - If Islamic militants in Gaza or Lebanon go to war with Israel, they could find their usual targets empty.
Israel is drawing up contingency plans to evacuate up to a quarter-million civilians from border communities to protect them from attacks from Hamas, Hezbollah or other Islamic militant groups.
The mass evacuations would be the biggest in Israel’s history, part of a bigger plan where the army works with municipalities to keep civilians safe.
All sides have been preparing in case a new round of warfare breaks out, although Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed group sworn to Israel’s destruction, currently is tied down in Syria’s civil war fighting in support of President Bashar Assad. It also comes amid an uptick in tensions between Israel, Syria and Hezbollah.
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