News from Multiple Perspectives

As el-Fasher is starved, Sudanese journalists struggle to report a war buried by blackouts and global neglect.

The US is deploying the world’s largest aircraft carrier to Latin America to curb drug trafficking.

Country in the South Caucasus has witnessed several serious incidents involving the illicit trade in nuclear materials.

[Premium Times] She described the period as one of the darkest moments of her life.

Microsoft is rolling out a new face for its AI, and its name is Mico. The company announced the new, animated blob-like avatar for Copilot’s voice mode yesterday as part of a “human-centered” rebranding of Microsoft’s Copilot AI efforts. Mico is part of a Microsoft program dedicated to the idea that “technology should work in service of people,” Microsoft wrote. The company insists this effort is “not [about] chasing engagement or optimizing for screen time. We’re building AI that gets you back to your life. That deepens human connection.” Mico has drawn instant and obvious comparisons to Clippy , the animated paperclip that popped up to offer help with Microsoft Office starting in the ’90s . Microsoft has leaned into this comparison with an Easter egg that can transform Mico into an animated Clippy . Read full article Comments

There are three species of bats that eat birds. We know that because we have found feathers and other avian remains in their feces. What we didn’t know was how exactly they hunt birds, which are quite a bit heavier, faster, and stronger than the insects bats usually dine on. To find out, Elena Tena, a biologist at Doñana Biological Station in Seville, Spain, and her colleagues attached ultra-light sensors to Nyctalus Iasiopterus , the largest bats in Europe. What they found was jaw-droppingly brutal. Inconspicuous interceptors Nyctalus Iasiopterus , otherwise known as greater noctule bats, have a wingspan of about 45 centimeters. They have reddish-brown or chestnut fur with a slightly paler underside, and usually weigh around 40 to 60 grams. Despite that minimal weight, they are the largest of the three bat species known to eat birds, so the key challenge in getting a glimpse into the way they hunt was finding sensors light enough to not impede the bats’ flight. Read full article Comments

Struggling to broker a peace deal in Ukraine, Trump hopes Xi Jinping could influence Vladimir Putin.

The deployment marks a major escalation in what the US says is a campaign against drug traffickers, which Trump warns will include "land action".

The former US vice-president made her strongest suggestion to date she will make another bid for the White House

Donald Trump advised pregnant women not to take Tylenol amid announcing a set of new autism policies. Health experts are concerned. What do the studies cited by the White House actually say?

A new study has observed that chimpanzees regularly eat fermented fruit together, suggesting that alcohol consumption is more deeply rooted in human evolution than previously thought.

An aggressive flu virus has gripped northern India. Two-thirds of families in the region are affected. Who's most at risk? And how can people protect themselves?

Washington describes first day of negotiations between Scott Bessent and He Lifeng as ‘very constructive’

MP for Manchester Central beats education secretary Bridget Phillipson

Consulting group and think-tank founded by former PM doubles down on artificial intelligence and seeks new donors

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has doubled down on comments he made about migration, saying many Germans and Europeans are "afraid to move around in public spaces." Merz has rejected criticism from some German political circles over his government’s tough stance on illegal immigration. "But we still have this problem in the cityscape, of course, and that’s why the federal interior minister is facilitating and carrying out large-scale deportations," he said during a visit to Potsdam last week. GERMANY BRACES UNDER COLLAPSING GOVERNMENT AND LOOMING TRUMP TRADE WAR The statement prompted backlash, some accusing the German leader of being racist. He rejected the criticism while on the sidelines of a summit on the Western Balkans in London, saying migrants were "an indispensable part of our labor market," German-based DW News reported. He also claimed that many people in Germany and across Europe are nonetheless "afraid to move around in public spaces" because of migrants "who do not have permanent residence status, do not work and do not abide by our rules," the outlet reported. MD GOV DEFENDS $190K TRUMP-CENTRIC IRISH CONSULTANT CONTRACT AS POTUS MOVES IN NEXT DOOR "I don’t know whether you have children. If you do, and there are daughters among them, ask your daughters what I might have meant. I suspect you’ll get a pretty clear and unambiguous answer. There’s nothing I need to retract," he said when asked if he would withdraw his earlier remarks. Some have signed a petition disputing Merz’s comments. The signees include actor Marie Nasemann and environmental activist Luisa Neubauer. "There are approximately 40 million daughters in this country. We have a genuine interest in ensuring that our safety is taken seriously," Neubauer wrote on Instagram. "What we are not interested in is being misused as a pretext or justification for statements that were ultimately discriminatory, racist and deeply hurtful."

Britain’s immigration system is under fire after officials confirmed an Ethiopian asylum seeker who sexually assaulted a 14-year-old girl and another woman was accidentally released from prison Friday, sparking a manhunt for the fugitive sex offender. Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu, 38, was sentenced in September to 12 months behind bars, Reuters reported . An "appalled" British Prime Minister Keir Starmer slammed the release of Kebatu, calling it "totally unacceptable," according to The Associated Press. His arrest in July ignited weeks of protests outside the Bell Hotel in Epping , a migrant housing site about 20 miles north of London, according to the report. DHS FLIPS SCRIPT ON MEDIA NARRATIVE WITH NEW DETAILS ABOUT ILLEGAL TEEN ARRESTED BY ICE: 'SAFETY THREAT' At its peak in 2023, the home secretary said more than 400 hotels were being used to house asylum seekers, costing nearly £9 million GBP per day, or roughly $11.3 million. "We share the view of communities nationwide that these hotels must close — including the Bell Hotel in Epping," U.K. Foreign Secretary and Labour MP Yvette Cooper wrote in a previous statement. "We are moving to do so as quickly as possible through a structured and sustainable plan, rather than through one-off court rulings that create more problems for other local areas or councils. "Such piecemeal decisions risk repeating the chaos that led to the large-scale use of hotels in the first place." Officials said Kebatu was supposed to be transferred to an immigration detention center for deportation but was mistakenly freed, according to the report. Britain's Secretary of State for Justice David Lammy wrote in an X post he was "appalled at the release in error at HMP Chelmsford." "We are urgently working with the police to track him down, and I’ve ordered an urgent investigation," Lammy wrote. "Kebatu must be deported for his crimes, not on our streets." Kemi Badenoch, a conservative member of Parliament for North West Essex, also made a fiery post, saying the " entire system is collapsing under Labour ." "The fake asylum seeker who sexually assaulted a child in Epping has been ‘released in error,’" Badenoch wrote. "How does that happen? Because the entire system is collapsing under Labour. Govt mistakenly letting people out instead of deporting. Those they deported are coming back. Nothing of substance has been done to address the threat to women and girls living in these communities." MIGRANT CRIMES AGAINST CHILDREN PILE UP IN BOSTON AREA AS MAYOR SLAMS BONDI OVER ‘SANCTUARY’ WARNING Badenoch said conservatives voted against Labour’s prisoner release program because it was "putting predators back on our streets," but she pointed out Kebatu was just convicted. "A level of incompetence that beggars belief," she wrote. "Only Conservatives have a plan for stronger borders and public order." Nigel Farage , a member of Parliament for Clacton and the leader of Reform UK, added on X, "The Epping hotel migrant sex attacker has been accidentally freed rather than deported. He is now walking the streets of Essex. Britain is broken."

The Trump administration has ordered the deployment of the Gerald R. Ford Carrier Strike Group in the Western Hemisphere as the U.S. continues to target suspected drug smuggling vessels in the Caribbean. "In support of the President’s directive to dismantle Transnational Criminal Organizations (TCOs) and counter narco-terrorism in defense of the Homeland, the Secretary of War has directed the Gerald R. Ford Carrier Strike Group and embarked carrier air wing to the U.S. Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM) area of responsibility (AOR)," chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement Friday. "The enhanced U.S. force presence in the USSOUTHCOM AOR will bolster U.S. capacity to detect, monitor, and disrupt illicit actors and activities that compromise the safety and prosperity of the United States homeland and our security in the Western Hemisphere," he added. "These forces will enhance and augment existing capabilities to disrupt narcotics trafficking and degrade and dismantle TCOs." TRUMP DOUBLES DOWN ON COLOMBIA CRACKDOWN, CALLS PETRO ‘LUNATIC,’ VOWS TO END ALL US PAYMENTS OVER DRUGS USSOUTHCOM's area of responsibility includes the land mass of Latin America south of Mexico, the waters adjacent to Central and South America and the Caribbean Sea. The strike group includes the USS Gerald R. Ford, the world's largest aircraft carrier, according to the U.S. Navy, as well as the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers USS Mahan, USS Winston S. Churchill and USS Bainbridge. The USS Gerald R. Ford is currently deployed to the Mediterranean Sea along with three destroyers. It would likely take several days for the ships to make the journey to South America. In August, the strike group transited the Strait of Dover, the narrowest part of the English Channel. The deployment would mean there will be no U.S. aircraft carriers in the Middle East for the first time in years. The Trump administration has ordered a number of strikes in the Caribbean aimed at dismantling and disrupting drug cartels in the region. Most recently, War Secretary Pete Hegseth announced on Friday that a strike on a vessel allegedly operated by suspected members of Tren de Aragua (TdA), a Venezuelan street gang deemed a Designated Terrorist Organization (DTO), killed six alleged narco-terrorists. ALLIANCE WITH US ‘DISMANTLED’ BY LEFTIST PETRO REGIME, COLOMBIA’S FORMER DEFENSE MINISTER SAYS "If you are a narco-terrorist smuggling drugs in our hemisphere, we will treat you like we treat al-Qaeda," Hegseth wrote on X. "Day or NIGHT, we will map your networks, track your people, hunt you down, and kill you." It marked the 10th strike targeting suspected drug trafficking boats since Trump returned to office. The president has made combating the nation’s drug crisis a central policy focus. Trump has accused Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro of being a drug cartel leader as he continues to increase pressure on the Maduro regime. Last week, Trump confirmed that he authorized the CIA to conduct covert operations in Venezuela, saying he did so because the South American nation has released prisoners into the U.S. and that drugs were coming into the U.S. from Venezuela through sea routes. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP Meanwhile, the military strikes have attracted scrutiny from both sides of the aisle as questions swirl about their legality. Sens. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., Tim Kaine, D-Va., and Rand Paul, R-Ky., recently introduced a war powers resolution that would prohibit U.S. armed forces from participating in "hostilities" against Venezuela. Fox News Digital's Diana Stancy and Fox News' Gillian Turner, Jennifer Griffin and James Levinson contributed to this report.

Left-wing independent Catherine Connolly is set to become Ireland's new president after early vote counting on Saturday indicated a landslide victory, leading her centrist rival Heather Humphreys to concede defeat.

France may see another government fall as early as next week as lawmakers debated budgetary amendments on Saturday, including a possible new tax on France's ultra-rich known as the "Zucman tax". The centre-left Socialist Party has threatened to use its crucial swing vote to topple the government if a wealth tax is not included in next year's budget.

The Pentagon has deployed an aircraft carrier strike group to counter what it claims are drug-trafficking organisations in Latin America, escalating a military build-up that has fuelled fears of conflict. Earlier, the US targeted boats in international waters, killing those on board. Cynthia J. Arnson, Director of the Latin American Programme at the Wilson Centre, said there is “very little evidence” the vessels were involved in drug trafficking, calling the legality of the strikes questionable. She added that the operation appears to be “far beyond a counter–drug-trafficking operation” and warned: “There is, I think, every reason to believe or expect that there will be attacks inside Venezuelan territory aimed at deposing the current dictatorship of Nicolás Maduro.”

Belgium arrests Egyptian activist who locked embassy in The Hague Submitted by MEE staff on Sat, 10/25/2025 - 14:46 Egyptian media says Anas Habib was accused of surveilling and threatening the Egyptian president Egyptian activist Anas Habib, who staged a protest at Egypt’s embassy in The Hague, speaks to Middle East Eye (Screengrab/MEE Live) Off Belgian authorities detained Egyptian activist Anas Habib and his brother, Tarek Habib, in Brussels during Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi’s visit earlier this week, Egyptian media reported. The reports said the arrests were over allegations that Habib had been surveilling and threatening Sisi during his visit to the EU-Egypt Summit. The activist drew attention in July when he chained shut the gates of Egypt’s embassy in the Netherlands to protest Cairo's closure of its border with Gaza amid Israel’s genocide in the besieged territory. Habib filmed himself attaching a bicycle lock around the gates of the embassy in The Hague, describing the act as a symbol of the Egyptian government’s claim that the crossing with Gaza had been closed by Israel and that it was powerless to reopen it.  He went on to do the same act at the Jordanian embassy in response to the kingdom’s response to Israel’s war. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); In an interview with Middle East Eye at the time, Habib said: “I know for 100 percent sure that the Egyptian regime is complicit in the genocide.” “This is just not an accusation; it's a fact.” At the age of 15, Habib was detained by Egyptian authorities for two years as a political prisoner. He said that if he were to return there now, he would be arrested or killed.  Cairo has said that incidents targeting its embassies in Europe are “malicious and suspicious actions” intended to distract international attention from “Israeli crimes in Gaza”. Egyptian reports said on Thursday that Belgian authorities took the brothers from their hotel on Wednesday morning and seized their phones as part of the investigation. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); They added that Belgium was working with Egyptian authorities to assess the alleged threats and investigate any potential plots.  On Wednesday, the EU and Egypt held their first joint summit, signing several loan deals, including one worth another €4bn ($4.6bn) in European aid for Cairo. Israel's genocide in Gaza News Post Date Override 0 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:19 Update Date Override 0

Rubio promises return of all Israeli captives' bodies from Gaza US Secretary of State Marco Rubio promised the return of all deceased captives held in Gaza during a meeting with two dead Israeli-American captives during a visit to Israel.  “We will not forget the lives of the hostages who died in the captivity of Hamas,” Rubio said on X. “Today, I met with the families of American citizens Itay Chen and Omer Neutra. We will not rest until their – and all – remains are returned.” We will not forget the lives of the hostages who died in the captivity of Hamas. Today I met with the families of American citizens Itay Chen and Omer Neutra. We will not rest until their — and all — remains are returned. pic.twitter.com/wdxN9vLXZ8 — Secretary Marco Rubio (@SecRubio) October 25, 2025

Gaza buried under 61m tonnes of rubble: UN A UN agency has warned that Gaza is buried under more than 61m tonnes of debris, with three-quarters of buildings in the besieged enclave destroyed after two years of war.   An assessment made by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) has determined that nearly two-thirds of the debris in Gaza was made in the first five months of the war.  The destruction of buildings also accelerated in the months leading up to the current ceasefire.  From April to July 2025, 8m tonnes of debris were generated mostly in the southern part of the territory between Rafah and Khan Younis.  A preliminary analysis of UNEP also noted that 2.9m tonnes of debris could be contaminated with "hazardous waste from known industrial sites". Satellite analysis by the United Nations Satellite Centre programme also found that the Israeli army destroyed nearly 193,000 buildings in Gaza, representing about 78 percent of existing structures before the war began on 7 October 2023. 

Was it the heist of the century or a master class in incompetence by the museum? Some prominent former jewelry thieves have plenty to say about the audacious break-in at the Louvre.

From Kuala Lumpur to Gyeongju, President Trump is casting himself as a deal-maker and peace negotiator, while a wary region looks for tariff relief and steadier ties.

He was asked to cater a climate event for Prince William and 700 guests. But omitting the famous local fish was like “asking Iron Maiden to play jazz.”

"Bust of a Woman with a Flowered Hat," a vividly hued Picasso portrait of longtime muse and partner Dora Maar, had remained hidden from public view for more than eight decades. (Image credit: Emma Da Silva)

The dazzling aerial photos honored by the 2025 Siena awards offer "new ways of seeing familiar places," as one judge puts it. (Image credit: Dennis Schmelz)

Prescription drug ads were once banned on broadcasts. But companies argued that infringed on free speech, and the drugs could help people. The FDA now permits pharmaceutical ads.

by Avi Asher-Schapiro , Mica Rosenberg and Jeff Ernsthausen ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they’re published. A Washington-based watchdog is calling for an inspector general investigation into potential conflicts of interest and ethics violations in the office of border czar Tom Homan related to government contracting. This follows reporting from ProPublica revealing a web of past business relationships involving Homan , his senior adviser Mark Hall, and consultants and firms seeking Department of Homeland Security contracts. The request by the Campaign Legal Center, a nonprofit nonpartisan government watchdog, also cites a story by MSNBC that reported that Homan had taken a $50,000 cash payment from undercover FBI agents posing as would-be DHS contractors seeking his help obtaining contracts. ProPublica revealed that Hall met this August with a company interested in winning contracts for immigrant detention centers. That meeting, at the Texas offices of a firm called Industrial Tent Systems, was also attended by Charlie Sowell, a consultant on ITS’ payroll. Sowell had paid Hall a $50,000 consulting fee as recently as February — right before Hall entered the border czar’s office working under Homan, government disclosure documents show. Sowell also had a business relationship with Homan. Before he became border czar, Homan had worked with Sowell’s firm SE&M Solutions to advise clients seeking contracts with DHS, according to government documents and an interview with Sowell. In June, Sowell told ProPublica he and Homan avoided any conflicts of interest. “Tom is an exceptionally ethical person,” said Sowell, who has declined further interview requests. The August meeting between Hall, ITS and Sowell may have violated federal ethics laws and merits an independent investigation, according to CLC. “When a senior official is involved in contracting decisions that stand to benefit a recent former employer, it raises serious questions about whether government decision making is impartial,” the CLC wrote in its Oct. 16 letter to DHS Inspector General Joseph Cuffari . “An IG investigation is needed to determine whether Hall’s actions violate federal ethics laws.” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson dismissed calls for an inquiry into Homan’s office. “Tom has always operated with the utmost integrity and is working tirelessly to keep all Americans safe,” she said, calling recent reports “debunked left-wing talking points.” Jackson has said that Homan has “no involvement in the actual awarding of a government contract” and that Hall has not been authorized by Homan to represent him. Homan, Hall and the inspector general’s office did not respond to requests for comment on the letter. Industrial Tent Systems has not responded to a comment request. Congress recently allocated $45 billion to massively expand immigration detention spaces, including plans to build an unprecedented series of tent camps on military bases across the country. The windfall of government money has drawn intense interest among DHS contractors and consultants, including some with past business relationships with Hall and Homan. Both men are bound by conflict-of-interest rules barring them from involvement in government discussions that could impact their former business partners, ethics experts have said. Homan has said repeatedly that he recused himself from all contracting matters. But ProPublica and Bloomberg have reported he has been involved in conversations with industry players about contracts . Neither DHS nor the White House would provide formal recusal documents sought by ProPublica. In a separate ethics complaint centering on Homan , the CLC asks the IG to “investigate to determine if Homan intentionally excluded information from his financial disclosure statement in violation of federal criminal law.” The ethics complaint alleges that if Homan received $50,000 from undercover FBI agents, it should have been reported on his financial disclosure forms. Homan has not only said he did nothing illegal, he recently maintained he never took the $50,000 . “This matter originated under the previous administration and was subjected to a full review by FBI agents and Justice Department prosecutors,” Jackson said this week. “They found no credible evidence of any criminal wrongdoing.”

by Rafael Carranza , Arizona Luminaria This article was produced for ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network in partnership with Arizona Luminaria . Sign up for Dispatches to get our stories in your inbox every week. Manuel Nieto Jr. and his sister had just pulled into a gas station to buy cigarettes and Gatorade when he noticed a sheriff’s deputy standing over two Latino men on the ground. Their north Phoenix neighborhood was on alert. Sheriff’s deputies had been targeting day-labor centers in the area and making traffic stops — arresting people who couldn’t prove their immigration status. They had one thing in common: They looked Latino. “No diga nada. Pídale un abogado,” Nieto’s sister, Velia Meraz, yelled to the detained men, according to court testimony. (“Don’t say anything. Ask for an attorney.”) The deputy warned Nieto and Meraz: “You need to get out of here, now.” Nieto drove around the corner to his dad’s auto repair shop as another deputy on a motorcycle followed him, siren and lights on, and patrol vehicles swarmed. Deputies approached — guns drawn. Nieto dialed 911 for help: Officers were harassing him, he would later testify in court. One pulled Nieto from his vehicle. Others pinned him to the ground and handcuffed him. Nieto’s father came running from his shop. “Let my children go,” Manuel Nieto Sr. said. “They’re U.S. citizens. What did they do wrong?” The raid that ensnared Nieto Jr. and Meraz 17 years ago was carried out under a federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement program that grants local police powers to check immigration status during traffic stops and other routine encounters. The Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office, under then-Sheriff Joe Arpaio, was among the first in the nation to test out ICE’s 287(g) task force program. Since President Donald Trump retook office in January, similar scenes of local officers joining in aggressive immigration arrests have multiplied as ICE has rapidly expanded the 287(g) task force program to deputize local police officers as de facto deportation agents. Moments after Manuel Nieto Sr. stormed out of his north Phoenix auto shop, the deputies left without arresting or citing his children. But Nieto Jr. and Meraz didn’t move on. They joined three other county residents in suing the sheriff’s office, accusing deputies of targeting them solely because they were Latino. A federal judge agreed that the task force’s traffic stops and raids on Hispanic neighborhoods, day-labor centers and other businesses had violated Latinos’ civil and constitutional rights. Even after the ruling, the judge found Arpaio continued to detain people based solely on suspected civil immigration violations. The U.S. Department of Justice also conducted a civil rights investigation into the sheriff’s office’s discriminatory practices, and ICE ended Arpaio’s 287(g) agreement. In 2012, ICE suspended all local police deportation task forces nationwide, only restarting them after Trump began his second term in January. Many Arizonans who lived through Arpaio’s 287(g)-fueled immigration-enforcement campaign see parallels between what happened in Maricopa County and what’s now playing out across the country as local officers join forces with ICE. They also foresee costly troubles for local agencies that follow in Maricopa County’s footsteps , including difficulty regaining the trust of Latino residents whose constitutional rights are violated by local officers. The White House and Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not respond to Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica’s questions. Arpaio told Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica that he became a target of political persecution for helping enforce immigration laws, which he saw as part of his job. “I’d do it over again,” Arpaio said. “I tell everybody: I didn’t do anything wrong. I had a federal court who was biased against me. And all they could get me out on was a contempt of court? Think of that.” Meanwhile, Maricopa County continues to reckon with its time allowing deputies to act as immigration officers. Under a settlement agreement, the court mandated broad oversight of the sheriff’s office and appointed a monitor to track its compliance. Since then, the law enforcement agency has been required to meticulously document all interactions with the public. In the 12 years since, the department has yet to convince the judge that its deputies don’t racially profile Latino drivers and that it adequately investigates deputies’ alleged misconduct. Salvador Reza is a longtime community organizer who advocates for day laborers in Phoenix. He said his work put him in the crosshairs of Arpaio’s immigration enforcement, leading to his arrest for obstruction during a protest. (The county declined to pursue charges against him.) Because of what happened in Maricopa County, he believes Latinos, including in the communities whose police departments have joined forces with ICE, are now more likely to be racially profiled. “At that time, we were a laboratory,” Reza said. “They did the experiment, and basically now they’re implementing it at the national level.” Guadalupe, Arizona, where most residents are Latino or Native American, became one of Arpaio’s targets for immigration enforcement, which escalated under a 287(g) task force agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. (Jesse Rieser for ProPublica) 368 Paragraphs on Required Reforms The lawsuit brought by Nieto Jr., Meraz and the other county residents became known as Melendres v. Arpaio — for Manuel de Jesus Melendres Ortega, a legal resident who was arrested in one of Arpaio’s sweeps. When U.S. District Judge G. Murray Snow certified it as a class-action suit in December 2011, he indicated racial profiling by the sheriff’s office had been so widespread it could have violated the constitutional rights of any Latino in Maricopa County, one-third of the population. The settlement contains 368 paragraphs outlining reforms. They range from creating a policy that bars racial profiling to developing a system that collects data on traffic stops to identify disparities in the race of motorists who are pulled over. To end court oversight, the sheriff’s office must be in “full and effective compliance” with the reforms continuously for three years. The department currently complies with more than 90% of the requirements, according to the monitor, but falls short in the two areas that most directly impact Latino drivers: eliminating racial bias in traffic stops and quickly investigating allegations of deputy misconduct. Snow found that traffic stops involving Latino drivers and passengers dragged on “beyond the time necessary to resolve the issue that initially justified the stop.” Ricardo Reyes said he repeatedly endured traffic stops as a young Latino growing up in the Maryvale neighborhood of west Phoenix, where three-quarters of the residents identify as Latino. He drove a nice car and believes deputies under Arpaio racially profiled him. “They would ask me for my license, they take it and then, ‘You’re free to go,’” recalled Reyes, who leads an advocacy group for military veterans. “Why was I stopped? I never got an answer.” Snow’s order requires deputies to document 13 data points for every traffic interaction, including when a stop began and ended, the reason for the stop, the driver’s perceived race and whether the deputy inquired about immigration status. The settlement overseen by U.S. District Judge G. Murray Snow includes hundreds of pages of reforms that the sheriff’s office must implement, including developing a policy to bar racial profiling and to create a data collection system for traffic stops. (Obtained by ProPublica) In a preliminary injunction, Snow wrote that sheriff’s deputies, “including officers associated with the special operations, circulated emails that compared Mexicans to dogs, ridiculed stereotypical Mexican accents, and portrayed Mexicans as drunks.” He singled out two of the deputies Nieto Jr. and Meraz encountered in north Phoenix for making arrests based on race during 287(g) operations. Roughly 77% of all arrests by the first deputy the siblings saw at the gas station had Hispanic surnames, the judge found. The deputy who pulled over Nieto Jr. arrested only Latinos during the operations he participated in. Even more concerning to Snow was that Arpaio continued such operations as a matter of policy after ICE pulled its 287(g) agreement in 2009. In other words, deputies continued making immigration arrests without authority from the federal government. The judge said that violated constitutional protections against unreasonable search and seizures. After Arpaio defied the order and refused to implement many of the reforms, Snow issued additional mandates in 2016. He also found Arpaio and three of his aides in civil contempt of court and referred all four to face criminal contempt charges, a misdemeanor. Another federal judge convicted only Arpaio of criminal contempt in 2017 and was set to sentence him to up to six months in jail. Two months before sentencing, Trump pardoned Arpaio. However, voters had already voted Arpaio out of office. His successors have faced the same oversight and have not fully complied with the court’s orders, according to the monitor’s reports. Kevin Johnson, an immigration law author and professor at the University of California, Davis School of Law who runs the Immigration Professor’s Blog , said settlements related to discrimination and civil rights violations often take a long time to resolve. He pointed to the 28-year-old Flores settlement, which still dictates the federal government’s treatment of children in border and immigration custody. “There may be complaints about the court monitoring, but the burden is on the leaders and the agencies to show that monitoring is no longer necessary,” he said. This January, newly elected Sheriff Jerry Sheridan, a Republican who had worked as Arpaio’s second-in-command, inherited the Melendres settlement. He argues the department has made enough progress to end the judge’s oversight. Snow acknowledged recently in court that Sheridan and the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office had made significant gains. “But the areas where he’s not in compliance are pretty important areas,” he said. The sheriff’s office analyzes traffic stop data quarterly to identify deputies with notable disparities in who they stop. An outside auditor evaluates annually any departmentwide disparities. The latest annual report shows improvements over the past decade, but also that deputies still arrest Latino drivers at higher rates than white drivers. Data from this past year also show that Black drivers, who are not covered by the Melendres settlement, face longer stop times and higher arrest rates. And all drivers of color are more likely to be searched than white drivers. In addition, the sheriff’s office acknowledged it has not investigated 640 deputy misconduct claims, some dating to 2015, according to the department’s most recent court filing. Snow had ordered that the backlog be cleared to hold the sheriff’s office more accountable after he found that Arpaio refused to implement many reforms. Raul Piña, a retired educator, witnessed the fear caused by Arpaio’s raids in his Latino-majority school district and surrounding neighborhoods in Maryvale. He has for the past decade served on the court-mandated Community Advisory Board, tasked with relaying to the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office any community concerns about policing that may violate the court orders. Piña says the department hasn’t done enough to regain the trust of Latino residents and its deputies continue targeting Latinos disproportionately. He worries that without court oversight, the department will backslide on policing based on skin color. “I strongly believe that the only thing holding MCSO back from a very public and enthusiastic participation in workplace raids and other forms of anti-immigrant practices — the only thing holding them back — is Melendres,” he said. David Redpath, research director for the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office’s Court Implementation Division, discusses data on traffic stops during a town hall meeting. (Jesse Rieser for ProPublica) “The Model Was Maricopa County” Nationwide, ICE now has more than a thousand 287(g) agreements with local law enforcement . Half are task force agreements like the one Arpaio deployed. In May, the Tennessee Highway Patrol was carrying out a task force operation in Nashville when troopers pulled over Edgardo David Campos, who had just left a vigil at his church. Campos pulled into a gas station south of the airport, where a swarm of uniformed and plainclothes immigration officers wearing green vests with the word “police” on the back surrounded his car. One began to pull him out of his vehicle, a video of the incident shows, drawing the attention of people nearby, including Dinora Romero. She grabbed her phone and began to record. “Si se lo llevan, no diga nada,” Romero yelled. (“If they take you, don’t say anything.”) ICE touted the Nashville operation as a success, even though the agency’s data showed more than half the nearly 200 people arrested had no criminal record. Advocates accused ICE and the Highway Patrol of using race and ethnicity to target drivers in Nashville’s Latino and immigrant neighborhoods. One in four residents of the neighborhood where Campos was stopped is Latino. In August, the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition filed a lawsuit against the Highway Patrol seeking access to public records about the May sweeps. Attorneys for the state argued in court that releasing those records would endanger officers. The Highway Patrol and state attorney general did not respond to requests for comment. With enforcement expanding, U.S. citizens have been wrongfully detained recently, like Nieto Jr. and Meraz were in 2008. In May, an 18-year-old Latino citizen recorded his arrest during an operation by the Florida Highway Patrol and Border Patrol targeting landscapers in West Palm Beach under a 287(g) agreement. He was released after six hours. In a statement , DHS said the teen “was part of a group of illegal aliens that resisted arrest during a traffic stop.” The Florida Highway Patrol said he “interfered” with a lawful investigation and was charged with obstruction. State prosecutors declined to pursue the charge, citing “insufficient evidence.” The Trump administration is trying to enlist even more local officers to help ICE and is offering financial incentives for departments that participate in the 287(g) program. Starting this month, the federal government will pay the salaries of officers certified under 287(g) agreements and offer “performance awards” of up to $1,000 for helping ICE with arrests and deportations. Meanwhile, the Trump administration has gutted federal offices that investigate police misconduct and civil rights violations. Advocates say some of the tactics used by local and federal officers to target Latinos in Trump’s deportation effort draw from Arpaio’s playbook. Raul Piña serves on a court-mandated community advisory board tasked with relaying to the sheriff’s office any residents’ concerns about policing that may violate the court’s orders. He said he is worried that without the oversight required by a settlement order, the department will backslide. (Jesse Rieser for ProPublica) “The model was Maricopa County,” said Piña, the advisory board member in the Maricopa County lawsuit. “The very public, very humiliating, demoralizing approach to the raids, and the cruelty — more than just the images in the television that were humiliating, it was the cruelty — and the violent apprehension of people in front of children,” Piña added. “All of those behaviors. All of those tactics. They stem from Maricopa County.” Arpaio said he did not want to take credit for the Trump administration’s work but was proud that deputies under his command were among the first local officers to help ICE make immigration arrests. In Florida, which has more departments with 287(g) agreements than any other state, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis has spent $245 million to set up a temporary detention center nicknamed Alligator Alcatraz. There, migrants are housed in chain-link cells inside tents. Some have compared it to Arpaio’s “Tent City,” where prisoners were held outdoors in sweltering desert temperatures. (It closed after Arpaio lost reelection in 2016.) In California, federal agents have focused on Home Depot stores, arresting people in parking lots — echoing Arpaio’s raids on day laborers. Maricopa County deputies, after getting 287(g) certified in 2007, carried out 11 immigration sweeps within five months outside a former furniture store in Phoenix that was a popular gathering spot for laborers. Snow noted that nearly everyone arrested there was Latino. “Trump is creating this complete culture of fear and terror in our community. And I think this is exactly what happened under Arpaio, with the workplace raids and the threat of deportation,” said Christine Wee, lead attorney for American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of Nieto Jr., Meraz and Melendres. First image: The courtyard of then-Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s “Tent City Jail.” Some have compared a Florida detention center nicknamed “Alligator Alcatraz” to Arpaio’s notorious jail, which closed after he left office. Second image: Maricopa County sheriff’s deputies check the shoes of an individual arrested in an immigration sweep under Arpaio. (First image: Charlie Riedel/AP Photo. Second image: AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin.) In July, a group that includes U.S. citizens, detained immigrants and advocacy groups sued the Trump administration , arguing that “indiscriminate” raids in Los Angeles targeted people with brown skin. A federal judge granted a temporary restraining order, barring immigration arrests based on race, speaking Spanish, type of employment or presence at a particular location. But on Sept. 8, the Supreme Court stayed the order in a 6-3 vote. Justice Brett Kavanaugh was the lone conservative justice to explain his decision. He affirmed the government can use a combination of factors like race and language to establish reasonable suspicion that a person is in the country unlawfully during the operations in Los Angeles. “To be clear, apparent ethnicity alone cannot furnish reasonable suspicion; under this Court’s case law regarding immigration stops, however, it can be a ‘relevant factor,’” Kavanaugh wrote. Even though the case continues, immigration advocates and the attorneys who filed the lawsuit said the court’s action essentially legalized racial profiling. Experts say that approach could filter down to local agencies partnering with ICE under the 287(g) program. “When you have ICE relying on racial profiling and promoting it as an effective immigration enforcement strategy, you can expect state local governments that are working with ICE to use race immigration enforcement,” said Johnson, the UC Davis law professor. That idea was echoed in Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s dissent to the ruling lifting the order in the Los Angeles case. She argued the decision makes all Latinos, including U.S. citizens, targets and “improperly shifts the burden onto an entire class of citizens to carry enough documentation to prove that they deserve to walk freely.” Sotomayor added, “The Constitution does not permit the creation of such a second-class citizenship status.” Arpaio said he believes that had the Supreme Court rendered such a decision two decades ago, the Melendres lawsuit and the legal troubles that followed would not have happened. “I was vindicated by the Supreme Court,” Arpaio said. “Everything they went after me is legal.” Civil rights experts dispute that, noting that Arpaio’s enforcement relied on race alone, which remains illegal. Sheridan believes the department has made enough progress to end court oversight stemming from a racial profiling lawsuit. (Jesse Rieser for ProPublica) “It Seems Like It’s Never-Ending” As the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office struggles to fully implement the court-mandated reforms, elected officials are losing patience with the requirements and the costs. By March, spending on the Melendres case and the implementation of its reforms had surpassed $300 million, the bulk of which — nearly $245 million — has gone to the sheriff’s office. Sheridan, the new sheriff, attributed those expenses to the creation of two divisions for implementing the settlement and the hiring of investigators to tackle the backlog of complaints against deputies. Thirty million dollars has gone to the monitor team since the monitor was appointed in 2013. In 2024, the last full fiscal year for which data is available, the county spent more than $39 million on the settlement. “That’s a recurring cost every year in perpetuity,” Sheridan said. Or at least until the settlement ends. But a report commissioned by Snow last year and published on Oct. 8 found that the sheriff’s office had “consistently overstated” costs attributed to compliance under the Melendres settlement. Sheridan questioned the report, telling Phoenix talk radio station KTAR that its authors “don’t have the expertise” to audit a large government agency . He said his office will hire an independent accountant to dispute the findings. “There’s no fraud here,” he said. The Republican majority on the county’s Board of Supervisors is calling for an immediate end to court oversight. “We just have to figure out a way to end this because it seems like it’s never-ending because the judge, they put on a new order, they change things, they move the goalposts, and so we need to resolve this,” Republican Supervisor Debbie Lesko, who represents communities policed by the sheriff’s office, told Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica. But the decision to end court oversight rests solely with Snow. During a recent hearing, the judge was clearly unhappy with a recent community meeting. The court-mandated meetings provide the plaintiffs — all Latino drivers in Maricopa County — a venue to get updates on progress toward reforms and to voice concerns to the sheriff and the monitor team. At the July gathering, Sheridan’s supporters packed the room and took control, shouting at speakers and interrupting the interpreter’s translations of the discussion into Spanish. The mostly older, white group of Sheridan supporters demanded an end to court oversight, citing the costs. They outnumbered the Latino community members and activists who want to keep the monitor in place until the sheriff’s office proves to Snow it no longer discriminates against Latinos. Snow said he would host the next community meeting inside the federal courthouse in downtown Phoenix. Sheridan also wants out of the settlement. He believes the strict mandates hinder deputies’ ability to do their jobs. “There’s no law enforcement agency that I’m aware of in this country under the same level of scrutiny,” Sheridan said. Latino advocates and community members worry complaints about the court mandates and the price tag will become an excuse, distracting from the root issue — the need to end racial profiling by the sheriff’s office. “When Sheridan tells us that it’s done, I’m not going to take his word for it,” said Reyes, who endured repeated traffic stops when Arpaio was sheriff. “I’m going to wait on the monitor. I’m going to wait for the judge. And when they say, ‘You know what? They are compliant.’ Then I’ll believe it. And even then, it’s going to be suspicious.” Chelsea Curtis of Arizona Luminaria contributed reporting. Gabriel Sandoval of ProPublica contributed research.

by Rafael Carranza , Arizona Luminaria This article was produced for ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network in partnership with Arizona Luminaria . Sign up for Dispatches to get our stories in your inbox every week. Arizona law enforcement agencies are largely rejecting a fast-growing ICE program that lets local officers act as deportation agents — citing the experience of the state’s largest sheriff’s office, which was booted from the program in 2009 after a federal judge found deputies racially profiled and violated the constitutional rights of Latinos. Even in Republican-led communities known for backing immigration measures, law enforcement leaders are steering clear of Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s 287(g) task force program, which the Trump administration is using to enlist local officers in its mass deportation efforts. Of at least 106 municipal police departments, sheriff’s offices and county attorneys in the state, nine currently have agreements to cooperate with ICE in making arrests, as of Oct. 15 . And only four Arizona departments have signed on since January, amid a national recruitment campaign that has prompted more than 900 agencies to join. The program’s explosive nationwide growth follows President Donald Trump’s Jan. 20 executive order that, among other things, called for local law enforcement to “perform the functions of immigration officers.” Local police have three ways of participating in the 287(g) program. The first two are through the Jail Enforcement and Warrant Service Officer models, which restrict local collaboration with ICE to people who’ve already been booked into their jails. The third way is through the Task Force Model, in which local officers “serve as a force multiplier” in federal immigration enforcement “during routine police duties,” according to ICE. ICE did not respond to Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica’s questions. Half of the agreements in Arizona are for jail enforcement, including the state’s prison system, the only statewide agency. It signed on in 2020. The Republican sheriffs of two Arizona counties that border Mexico, Yuma and Cochise, signed 287(g) warrant service agreements for their jails this year, along with Navajo County, in the far northeast part of the state. The only local agency in Arizona to sign a task force agreement since ICE revived them in January is the County Attorney’s Office of Pinal County, a Republican stronghold sandwiched between the Phoenix and Tucson metro areas. ICE, under the Obama administration, suspended all task force agreements in 2012. The move followed a Department of Justice investigation that found the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office, which had a task force agreement under former Sheriff Joe Arpaio , used “discriminatory policing practices including unlawful stops, detentions and arrests of Latinos.” In 2013, a federal judge ruled that under Arpaio the sheriff’s office had discriminated against Latinos during immigration enforcement operations, violating their Fourth and 14th amendment rights against unreasonable searches and seizures and to equal protection under the law, respectively. “I’ve never been guilty of anything,” Arpaio told Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica, despite the judge’s rulings. “They went after me. But that’s OK. And you can tell your audience I’ll do it again.” Pinal County Attorney Brad Miller, a Republican, said he intends to certify four deputies under the task force agreement he signed in August. Miller said these investigators will process immigration violations involving people they encounter during child abuse and drug investigations, instead of waiting on ICE officers. He said he does not foresee them participating in ICE raids. Miller prosecuted sex crimes in Maricopa County when Arpaio’s 287(g) task force agreement was in effect. He said he remembers the “chaos that ensued from that” and doesn’t want it repeated in Pinal County. “We have zero intention and we will not be participating in any immigration raids or task forces. I just want to make that clear.” Miller said he spoke with federal officials his agency works with before signing the task force agreement. “‘Would we be required to join specifically an immigration task force?’ That was my first question, and the answer came back as no,” he said. “If that were one of the prerequisites, I was not going to do the program.” Starting in October, ICE began reimbursing local agencies with task force agreements for the salaries of certified officers and paying “performance awards” of up to $1,000 per officer. Miller said money didn’t influence his decision. None of his four deputies will be assigned full time to the 287(g) agreement, he said, only as needed in the course of their other task force investigations. Santa Cruz County Sheriff David Hathaway, a Democrat, believes the financial incentives are a federal ploy to pull local officers away from their everyday duties and direct them to immigration enforcement. “I consider the program to be illegal,” said Hathaway, whose county shares a border with Mexico. He bases this view on court rulings on Arizona’s landmark 2010 anti-illegal immigration law. The “show me your papers” law was the toughest state immigration law in the nation at the time. But the Supreme Court struck down most of its provisions, leaving in place only one that allows local police to check immigration status as long as it doesn’t prolong the public’s interaction with officers. “The Supreme Court said this is not in the realm of local law enforcement,” Hathaway said. “This is entirely a federal issue.” States including Texas and Florida have since enacted laws to more aggressively curb illegal immigration. Florida was also among the first to require all county law enforcement agencies to sign on to the 287(g) program. Other states, largely in the Southeast, have followed suit. Arizona’s Republican-controlled Legislature this year passed a similar requirement for its local law enforcement agencies called the Arizona ICE Act . But the state’s Democratic governor, Katie Hobbs, vetoed it. Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos, a Democrat who runs southern Arizona’s largest sheriff’s department, has vowed not to involve his deputies in deportation arrests. The county shares a 130-mile border with Mexico. Nanos has said his department is instead focused on preventing crime, and to do that it’s imperative his deputies build trust with communities they protect, including migrant ones. “The stance we take is: ‘Look, you have a job to do and I have a job to do,’” Nanos says in a video released by his office this year. “But clearly immigration laws, enforcement of those laws, that is the federal government’s job.” In Maricopa County, home to a majority of Arizona’s population, Sheriff Jerry Sheridan says he’s hesitant to have his deputies certified to patrol with ICE, mainly because his office remains under strict court oversight related to its past experiment with the 287(g) program. But Sheridan has endorsed the ICE program’s work inside local jails and said that’s where Maricopa County got it right on cooperating with federal immigration enforcement. “They’re focusing on the criminal illegal aliens,” he said of local jail partnerships with ICE. “And that’s really what a law enforcement agency should be concerned with, is people that commit crimes here in Maricopa County. And that’s what I’m concerned with.” Sheridan is working to rebuild trust with Latinos that was broken by Arpaio’s raids and sweeps, beginning when the sheriff’s office entered a 287(g) agreement. For Hathaway, the Santa Cruz county sheriff, lost trust is his biggest concern with deputies enforcing immigration laws in a border county that’s 83% Latino. “I don’t want to have any animosity between the local population and our sheriff’s office,” he said. “I want them to trust us and not think just because they’re Hispanic, we’re chasing them.”

Chinese President Xi Jinping put his personal stamp on the national master plan for the next five years, with state media describing the plan’s framework as Xi’s brainchild – an indication of the document’s political weight. In a lengthy article on Saturday detailing some of the build-up to the Communist Party’s fourth plenum this week, state news agency Xinhua and party mouthpiece People’s Daily said Xi “personally headed” the team that drafted the outline for the next five-year plan. “[He]...

For two years, Malaysian conservationists tracked a tiger named “Bulan” as she raised four cubs. Then a fatal traffic accident made her another statistic in the country’s dwindling population. Malaysia’s national animal is in trouble. Poaching, food loss and diminishing habitat have slashed the population from 3,000 in the 1950s to less than 150 roaming free today, according to official estimates. The government said last month it was ramping up efforts to combat wildlife crime, introducing...

Footage of a police undercover crackdown on minibus commuters in Hong Kong has gone viral on social media, and the force will issue summonses to 31 passengers for failing to wear their seat belts. The Post breaks down the mandatory seat belt requirements for passengers on public and private transport. 1. What happened during police’s undercover operation on minibus passengers on Friday? According to police, the enforcement took place on Friday and involved undercover officers from its Kowloon...

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Commander James Conway says finding Kebatu, whose arrest sparked riots over the summer, is a ‘top priority’ A delivery driver called Sim, who spoke to Hadush Kebatu at Chelmsford prison has told Sky News the “confused” offender was guided to the railway station by prison staff. Sim was delivering equipment to the prison on Friday when Kebatu was released in error instead of being handed over to immigration officials for deportation. He came out of the airlock, and kept saying to the officers there, ‘Where am I going? What am I doing? I don’t know where I’m going and what I’m doing.’ He was holding a pack of paperwork in his arms, and his bag of bits … He knew he’d been deported. He came over to me and said, ‘I need you to help me.’ I am appalled that it has happened and it’s being investigated. The police are working urgently to track him down, and my Government is supporting them … This man must be caught and deported for his crimes. Let us be clear, we inherited a collapsing prison system in which the last government was releasing people early and which our prisons were overflowing. And, indeed, we have a sentencing bill in parliament seeking to address that issue, and we have stabilised the system. Continue reading...

Heather Humprehys concedes defeat after early vote tallies show insurmountable gap between the candidates The leftwing independent candidate, Catherine Connolly, has won a landslide victory in Ireland’s presidential election. Her rival, Heather Humprehys, conceded defeat on Saturday afternoon after early vote tallies showed an insurmountable gap between the candidates. Continue reading...

Experts say there has been an 80% drop-off since serial killing peaked in the US in the 1970s – but that hasn’t stopped social media speculation For the past two years, rumors of a serial killer have preoccupied residents of Austin, Texas, and beyond as body upon body kept turning up at a lake in the city. The killer was even given a name: the Rainey Street Ripper. But authorities now say some 36 drownings in the lake, near Rainey Street neighborhood, were probably related to alcohol and drug consumption and the reservoir’s proximity to the city’s famous bar scene. Continue reading...

Russian strikes on Ukraine overnight left four people dead and several others injured, days after President Trump issued sanctions on Russian oil companies as peace talks in the region have largely been stagnant. In Kyiv, two people were killed and at least 13 wounded from a ballistic missile strike early Saturday, Tymur Tkachenko, head of…

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White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller on Friday dodged a question from reporters about the potential for ground troops on Venezuelan soil, as tensions escalate amid the Trump administration’s war on drugs in the Caribbean. While he said he “would not now or ever get into any detailed discussion” about potential military options,…

The Trump administration is allowing a stockpile of nearly $10 million worth of contraceptives to expire in a Belgian warehouse — despite pleas from nonprofit organizations to allow them to deliver the life-saving aid intended for low-income women primarily in sub-Saharan Africa. Earlier this year, the State Department announced plans to incinerate the contraceptives , which were originally intended for distribution by the U.S. Agency for International Development before Trump dismantled it . The medication includes $9.7 million worth of IUDs, implants, and birth control pills, some of which will get too old to deliver starting in December. An estimate from the Guttmacher Institute found that the contraceptives could provide pregnancy prevention to roughly 1.6 million women . The Trump administration isn’t just wasting money, said Jennifer Driver, senior director of reproductive rights at the State Innovation Exchange, “it’s wasting lives.” Because of high rates of maternal mortality, she said the undelivered aid could result in “millions of unintended pregnancies, thousands of preventable deaths.” The Belgian government initially foiled the Trump administration’s plans to destroy the contraceptives by intervening to block the incineration. Now, the U.S. is using another weapon to destroy the medical aid: time. The U.S. is using another weapon to destroy the medical aid: time. Tanzania, which was supposed to receive the largest bulk of the contraceptive haul, requires that these medical products have 60 percent of their remaining shelf life when they enter customs, said Marcel van Valen, head of supply chain for the International Planned Parenthood Federation. “That threshold is actually being reached for some of the products by the end of December,” he said, “and for most products towards mid-2026.” Experts in reproductive health and supply chains told The Intercept that the Trump administration is attempting to “run out the clock” on the contraceptives’ shelf life, wasting millions of taxpayer dollars and putting countless lives at risk. “The U.S. government is waiting to run out the clock on this, which is basically the same thing as lighting them on fire,” said Beth Schlachter, senior director of U.S. external relations for MSI Reproductive Choices, one of the organizations offering to distribute the contraceptives. Over the last several months, the Trump administration has provided a litany of excuses for leaving the contraceptives in storage.  One explanation has been the cost . “Their claim is that incinerating the full stock would cost them approximately $167,000 and they hold that against distributing the stocks to their intended destination,” said van Valen. International Planned Parenthood estimates distribution would cost between $1 million and $1.5 million. Multiple reputable international nonprofit organizations, including the United Nations Population Fund, the Gates Foundation, the International Planned Parenthood Foundation, and the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, have offered to purchase, re-label, and distribute the products themselves — at no cost to the Trump administration. While her organization, MSI Reproductive Choices, also placed a bid to distribute the contraceptives, Schlachter said the work could have easily been done by the United Nations Population Fund, also known as UNFPA.  “UNFPA already had a supplies process that was able to move large volumes,” she said, “and it could have easily absorbed these commodities because it was already doing that, and is already still doing this for many countries.”  The problem here isn’t money, argued Schlacter — it’s ideology. She pointed to an extremist right-wing ethos that views contraception as an extension of abortion. The State Department did not respond to The Intercept’s request for comment. However, in statements to other news outlets, the administration has claimed that the contraceptives were abortifacients, and that they couldn’t find an “eligible buyer” because their internal policies prohibit them from providing funds to organizations that provide abortion care or offer information on abortion. “President Trump is committed to protecting the lives of unborn children all around the world,” a spokesperson for USAID told The New York Times in September. “The administration will no longer supply abortifacient birth control under the guise of foreign aid.” The Intercept obtained the manifest for the contraceptives, which includes the intended recipient countries as well as the products being warehoused, and none of them are abortion drugs. Additionally, experts told The Intercept that multiple organizations that would not have violated that policy stepped forward to offer to distribute the contraceptives. “There are some very religious conservative folks who are now the skeleton [crew] of the global health team,” said Schlacter, who previously served as a senior policy adviser on sexual and reproductive health and rights at the State Department. “Many of them were blocking this contraception because they want to cut off all contraception, because they believe anything other than a barrier method is actually tantamount to abortion, which is outrageous.” Access to contraceptives in sub-Saharan Africa is a matter of life or death, said Saifuddin Ahmed, a professor in the Department of Population, Family, and Reproductive Health at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.  Despite making up roughly 16 percent of the global population, sub-Saharan Africa accounts for 70 percent of maternal deaths globally, according to the World Health Organization . “In family planning literature, there’s something called too early, too late, too many,” Ahmed explained. “Basically it’s simply saying that if a woman has a birth, let’s say before their pelvic organs develop, that is too young, in an adolescent period, they’re likely to die more. If they have too many children spaced very narrowly — we call it a short birth interval — they will die at a higher rate.”    The same goes for older women, he said. Access to birth control can disrupt that deadly cycle. “Our research has shown family planning is probably the most cost-effective tool for reducing maternal mortality,” said Ahmed. “Not providing this type of commodity to the countries in Sub-Saharan Africa means that their maternal mortality rate will go much, much higher. Child death will also go higher.” According to UNFPA , in 2022, contraceptive use averted more than 141 million unintended pregnancies, 29 million unsafe abortions, and nearly 150,000 maternal deaths. Read Our Complete Coverage The End of Roe Elizabeth Sully, director of international research for The Guttmacher Institute, said while it’s worth focusing on saving the contraceptives stored in Belgium, this is just the beginning of the impact the Trump administration is having on family planning and maternal mortality efforts globally. The United States’ family planning programs accounted for 40 percent of all donor funding for family planning globally. But earlier this year, the Trump administration ended their financial suppor t for global family planning programs. An estimate from the Guttmacher Institute found that the cuts to family planning grants will result in 34,000 more maternal deaths just this year. Mallah Tabot, lead sexual and reproductive health architect of cooperation at the International Planned Parenthood Federation’s Africa regional office, described the Trump administration’s move as pure “wickedness.” “Life-saving drugs are sitting somewhere withheld from those who need them the most, and rather than just doing the decent thing … they would rather play the waiting game until the products are no longer viable,” said Tabot. “What can the government say that would justify this level of wickedness?” The post Trump Would Rather Let Birth Control Expire Than Give It to Africans as Aid appeared first on The Intercept .

New York City is on the cusp of an election in which what once looked impossible has begun to seem inevitable. Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist member of the New York state Assembly, is heavily favored to beat Andrew Cuomo, New York’s onetime Democratic governor and a former icon of the party establishment, in a race for mayor that has become among the most-watched in the nation. Cuomo and Mamdani articulate two vastly different visions for New York City — and where the Democratic Party is going overall. This week on The Intercept Briefing, Akela Lacy speaks to people hoping to see each of those two visions fulfilled. “Traditionally, we’ve thought about politics as left, right, and center,” says Alyssa Cass, a Democratic strategist who has worked on local and national campaigns. “Zohran offered a message that was less about ideology and more about disrupting a failed status quo that is working for almost no one.” Cass, who worked on Andrew Yang’s mayoral campaign in 2021, isn’t working for Mamdani but says his candidacy indicates “that Democrats can win when we have ideas.” In the view of Jim Walden, a former mayoral candidate who is now backing Cuomo, those ideas are “dangerous and radical policies.” He says Mamdani’s popularity is an indication that “there’s going to be a flirtation with socialism and maybe some populist push” among Democrats.  But “ultimately,” Walden says, “the party will come back closer to the center.” Chi Ossé, a City Council member who endorsed Mamdani, sees Mamdani’s success as evidence of the opposite. “We could have gone back to or continued this trend of electing centrist, moderate Democrats,” Ossé says. Instead, he thinks that New Yorkers want “someone who ran as a loud and proud democratic socialist who has always fought on the left.” While New York City is preparing for a general election, Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa is unlikely to win — turning the race almost into a second Democratic primary. “The party is now confronted with a choice,” says Lacy, “between a nominee who has become the new face of generational change in politics and a former governor fighting for his political comeback. The results could reveal where the party’s headed in next year’s midterms and beyond.” Listen to the full conversation of The Intercept Briefing on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , or wherever you listen. Transcript Akela Lacy: Welcome to The Intercept Briefing. I’m Akela Lacy.  There’s less than two weeks left before New Yorkers elect their next mayor. The race has drawn national attention — both from President Donald Trump and from observers who see it as a reckoning over the future of the Democratic Party. PIX11 News: Zohran Mamdani continues to hold an insurmountable lead over former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the race for New York City mayor, as long as Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa stays in it. AL: Even though New York Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani decisively won the Democratic primary in June, the general election has pretty much boiled down to a contest between two candidates trying to claim the Democratic mantle. There’s Mamdani — the party’s nominee — and former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who resigned in 2021 amid sexual harassment allegations that he now denies and has been chasing the mayoralty as his political comeback. Since he lost the primary, Cuomo’s running on an independent ballot line called “Fight and Deliver,” but he’s still pitching himself as a Democrat. There’s also Curtis Sliwa — the founder of the Guardian Angels, Republican candidate, and a thorn in the side of those who want him out of the race to clear a lane on the right for Cuomo. That’s the position of billionaires like John Catsimatidis and Bill Ackman, who have been pushing to get Sliwa out. Curtis Sliwa: Come on Ackman, stay in your lane. Does he know anything about politics? No. Does he live in New York City? No. He lives in Chappaqua, the whitest suburb of America, where even the lawn jockeys are white.  AL: It’s also the position of President Trump.  Donald Trump: We don’t need a communist in this country. But if we have one, I’m going to be watching over him very carefully, on behalf of the nation.  AL: The Trump administration already got its wish when current New York City Mayor Eric Adams dropped out of the race last month, and the conventional wisdom was that many Adams supporters would flock to Cuomo. But after a federal corruption indictment that disappeared when Trump swept into office — remember that? — Adams’s support was already plummeting. And with Sliwa unlikely to become mayor himself, the race is really seen as a contest between Mamdani and Cuomo. Now, Mamdani and Cuomo represent two possible paths the Democratic Party could take: a democratic socialist who was once deemed too far to the left to pull off a primary and is now heavily favored to win the general versus a former Democratic governor who can count the Republican president in his camp. What does the saga say about the state of Democratic politics across the nation? That question is facing Democrats at a time when the national party is still finding itself after a crushing loss that returned Donald Trump to the White House.  Related AOC: The New York State Democratic Party’s Corruption May Have Cost Democrats the House Two years before that, a humiliating performance in the 2022 midterms threw the New York state Democratic Party into crisis, when Democrats in the state lost congressional seats and helped hand Republicans control of the House of Representatives. In the state that gave us both insurgent leader Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the two top Democrats in Congress — Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries — the party is now confronted with a choice between a nominee who has become the new face of generational change in politics and a former governor fighting for his political comeback. The results could reveal where the party’s headed in next year’s midterms and beyond. So today, we’re going to talk to people hoping to see each of those two visions fulfilled. First, we’ll hear from a City Council member backing Mamdani and a Democratic strategist who’s been following the race but isn’t working for any campaign. And after the break, we’ll hear from a former mayoral candidate who dropped out and endorsed Cuomo, saying he doesn’t want to see the Democratic Party veer toward socialism. Joining me now is Chi Ossé. He’s the Council Member for New York City’s 36th District. He endorsed Mamdani in April. Welcome to the show, Council Member Ossé. Chi Ossé: Thank you so much for having me on. AL: Also joining us is Alyssa Cass, a Democratic media strategist based in New York City and partner at Slingshot Strategies. She served as an adviser to top elected officials, candidates, and causes at the national, state, and local levels. Welcome to the show, Alyssa. Alyssa Cass: Hi. It is so good to be here.  AL: We’re speaking on Wednesday, October 22nd. [ Editor’s note: On October 24, Politico reported that Rep. Hakeem Jeffries will be endorsing Zohran Mamdani . ] And just a note, we are not endorsing any candidate on this podcast, and we’re focusing on the pressures building both locally and nationally on the Democratic party. To start, especially for our listeners outside of New York, why has Mamdani’s campaign become a national story? You have Fox News running wall-to-wall coverage, Trump calling to deport him — what exactly is bringing so much national attention to this race? Chi, we’ll start with you. CO: Absolutely. Well, first and foremost, I believe that it’s one of the biggest races that we’re seeing post-November of 2024. And after Republicans secured levels within Congress as well as the presidency, people are looking at the Democratic Party and seeing how we respond to that especially within the New York City mayoral race. You know, we could have gone two ways. We could have gone back to or continued this trend of electing centrist, moderate Democrats — or we could have gone with Zohran Mamdani, someone who ran as a loud and proud democratic socialist who has always fought on the left, who speaks up about Palestinian rights and sovereignty. And this race showed that the party is accepting and willing to move to the left. Zohran ran a very creative, loud race that was centered around affordability and did so without being tied to the financial institutions and entities that usually elect our mayors here within New York City. And made a lot of noise during the campaign, galvanized a lot of people, and made some history in terms of how the campaign was run. So with all of that, it made this a historic race, one that has caught the ears of many and has skyrocketed Zohran into the place where he is today. AL: Alyssa, I want to bring you in. I mean, you worked on the 2021 mayoral race, you’ve worked on national races. What’s your perspective on what is making this resonate with people outside of New York or have the potential ramifications that go beyond the city?  AC: I think about that question in kind of two primary buckets. The first is, why is this so interesting? One is, I think that it offers us a view of politics and the contours of politics that’s actually more realistic or how actual people think about it. Traditionally, we’ve thought about politics as left, right, and center. And I think that the major fault line in politics now, or how people think about it, is that the status quo is not working for almost anyone. “He fundamentally reconstituted the electorate. … He was able to put together a coalition of, frankly, almost everyone, just other than the very wealthy.” And if we don’t reform the status quo, we are going to break it. And Zohran offered a message that was less about ideology and more about disrupting a failed status quo that is working for almost no one. And that approach to the race offers Democrats a really powerful path forward. And as we think about how do we reconstitute winning coalitions — and that’s something I think has been a little under appreciated about Zohran’s win — he fundamentally reconstituted the electorate. If you live in New York City — if you are working class, middle class, or even upper middle class — New York City is not working for you. If you are anyone who interacts with public services on a daily basis, if you’re sending your kid to public school, if you’re taking the bus, if you’re riding the subway, New York City life is really like — hard. AL: You can say the f-word, it’s OK. AC: It’s really fucking hard. And he was able to put together a coalition of, frankly, almost everyone, just other than the very wealthy. And frankly offer an optimistic view of politics that brought us together about what unites us: that no one’s having an easy time. Obviously there are different degrees to that, but these parallel crises of affordability for almost every American tapping into that is the path forward for anyone who wants to win. And I think that those two reasons: of one, seeing the electorate not in these ideological terms that I think mostly people like us think about, but normal people don’t, and the ability to rebuild a democratic coalition, is exactly what people are talking about, and it’s not done through, like, big focus groups about what men are thinking or what words we’re saying, but how to build a coalition of people for whom the status quo isn’t working, which is almost everyone. AL: We’re speaking on the morning after a shocking immigration raid in Manhattan’s Chinatown where federal agents arrested multiple people. New York has sanctuary city laws that forbid cops and other local officials from coordinating with federal immigration enforcement. And as of this recording, Mayor Eric Adams and the NYPD say the city had nothing to do with the raid. Both Cuomo and Mamdani have put out statements condemning the raid. But more specifically in a moment like this, how should a New York City mayor respond? Chi, start with you. CO: Absolutely. Well, I don’t believe a word that comes out of Eric Adams’s mouth. And he is an accomplice if not a lapdog to Donald Trump. So in terms of the statements that were shared, I do not believe him. A mayor, and hopefully the next mayor, will uphold our sanctuary laws and also work with the NYPD and use his authority to make sure that all people who live here in New York City are protected regardless of their immigration status when it comes to federal agents infringing on the rights of the land here in New York. AC: Yeah, I think something we saw last night, but we’ve seen kind of throughout the past few months, are reminders of, is that Donald Trump is coming for New York City regardless. And what New Yorkers want is not someone who is promising to work with Trump, or can manage Trump, or who has a history of negotiating with Trump. That we’re actually seeing that like that doesn’t matter. “What New Yorkers want is not someone who is promising to work with Trump, or can manage Trump, or who has a history of negotiating with Trump.” We really need someone who is principled, incredibly disciplined in saying, “Donald Trump, hands off New York.” And we’ve actually seen this dynamic, I think, play out in a really interesting way throughout this general election. I think that you saw, at the end of the primary, you saw Cuomo beginning to try to socialize with New Yorkers. “If Donald Trump’s coming after New York, you want someone who can give him a call and talk him down.” We’re seeing that like that’s not possible, was never possible. There was so much coverage about New York City’s shift to the right, the increase in New York City voters who voted for Trump. They were voting for Trump, I think what we’re seeing now is not because they wanted ICE raids that destroy communities, destroy our economies, and rip our New York City neighbors from their schools and their homes — they wanted someone who was listening. So the best way to actually fight Trump and to rebuild a Democratic Party is not through compromise, but really through a pursuit of our principles and our values. AL: And I want to draw this out to the national level too, because this is extremely parallel with the criticisms, you know, facing national Democrats — Chuck Schumer, et cetera, Hakeem Jeffries in Congress — and this idea that at the beginning of Trump’s term, national Democrats really were sitting back and saying, “Is there a world in which we can play nice with Trump and have some leverage, some negotiating, leverage some power? Something to bring to the table.” And it quickly became obvious that that wasn’t going to work. But also that was extremely infuriating to voters. And I think that’s why you’re seeing Democrats pivot with this shutdown strategy . Whereas back in March, they were saying, let’s try to work with Republicans where we can . But I think what you’re saying, Alyssa, is that that is not something that voters have the patience for anymore. And I think that’s not just a New York City thing, that’s a national thing.  AC: Yeah. I think part of why Donald Trump won or why you’ve seen Democrats struggle is that when the status quo isn’t working, bad ideas beat no ideas. And we’ve often been the party and had candidates that are “no ideas.” And what we are seeing is that Democrats can win when we have ideas. Zohran is a case study of that. So when trying to manage or handle Trump, the idea isn’t to go along or get along. That’s a “no idea.” “When the status quo isn’t working, bad ideas beat no ideas. … What we are seeing is that Democrats can win when we have ideas. Zohran is a case study of that.” We need new ideas and preparedness. I think one of the biggest tasks of the future mayor is getting prepared for an escalation in the assault on New York City. We know he’s coming. I think we have every reason to expect National Guard or federal troops and making sure we’re prepared, right? Making sure we are setting the rules of the road with NYPD and other agencies and cooperating with that sort of incursion. And that will be like day one after the general election, the real work of the mayor-elect. AL: Chi, do you want to add anything on the tail end of that? CO: I absolutely agree with Alyssa’s point. I also do want to note that on the topic of national Democrats and them wanting to work with Trump and at least see if there’s a middle ground — Trump doesn’t give a fuck, right? And his whole modem operandi is to embarrass Democrats and has been doing so both with Chuck and Hakeem. In addition to that, our leadership in the Democratic Party somewhat ushered this type of behavior in. Back when Mahmoud Khalil was disappeared right here in the city, both of those individuals were very quiet, if not timid, on making statements and being very loud about their statements in the disappearing of people and disappearing of Mahmoud Khalil. They kind of set the precedent for this to happen, especially here in this city. So to have a mayor-elect and future mayor who’s going to speak truth to power and stand on business when it comes to how evil ICE is, right? And call-out how un-American and Gestapo-like that ICE is, is going to be something that I believe will resound with New Yorkers. And that New Yorkers want to see their elected officials, their mayor, their Democrats fighting for, right? AL: So jumping back in time a little bit, shortly after the primary, there was a ton of reporting on how New York’s wealthiest business leaders were working to defeat Mamdani, including offering to help Adams find a private sector job if he dropped out. One of the city’s biggest real estate developers was floated as an option at one point. But last week, JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon said he would support Mamdani if he won. What’s your reaction to that? If Mamdani wins, Alyssa, what sorts of roadblocks can he expect from the city’s elite? AC: Mamdani’s done a lot of work to assuage and do a charm campaign with the business community. AL: Right.  AC: Not because he’s going to betray his agenda, but because it’s a savvy observation that they’re actually pretty easy to pacify, right? And is avoiding, I think, some of the missteps that Bill de Blasio did. Bill de Blasio got pretty beat up immediately by the business community. But the business community is actually easy to charm, right? The thing that they care about the most, that most materially impacts them — like, let’s say raising taxes — a mayor of New York City actually doesn’t have much, doesn’t have any control over. So when it comes to the business community, I think that a little bit of engaging, showing that you’ll pick up their calls — which Bill de Blasio was unwilling to do — goes a long way. And that ultimately, the mayor of New York City is not materially impacting these people who are really out for themselves. And that actually creates an environment where [it’s] easy to give them a little face-time and then I think they shut up. AL: To your point, you said he’s meeting with these people not because he is going to betray his agenda, but that is what some people are concerned about. AC: I think you want to like — Listen, being mayor is really fucking hard, and you have a very limited runway before everyone is going to start shitting on you and be very critical. And it’s hard to implement your agenda. Clearing the decks from a chorus of haters or trying to lessen them a bit is not kowtowing. It’s just paving the way for an easier time, because there are going to be actual crises to deal with. So I think it’s clearing a smoother runway for when you’re actually sworn in. And there’s so much out of your control — like there could be a snowstorm that becomes a disaster — that you want to clear the decks, shut up the haters by dishing out a little sugar. That’s savvy, not being compromised. AL: I want to put this to both of you. How can we expect those same people to react to a Cuomo win? Chi, we’ll start with you.  CO: The business people?  AL: Yeah. And you know, the elite of of New York, the people who, you know, originally were partnering with Bill Ackman to try to figure out how to—  CO: Yeah. I mean, I think they want Cuomo to win, obviously. I do believe that a majority of the elite want Cuomo to win. I think it’s more about what Zohran means for politics, right? He was able to win without the backing and being tethered again to these financial institutions. And many of these elite folks want elected officials that they can control. And if someone can win as mayor of New York City without being tethered to their power, what could that mean for city council, state Assembly, state Senate, and even some of our congressional seats? “If someone can win as mayor of New York City without being tethered to their power, what could that mean for city council, state Assembly, state Senate, and even some of our congressional seats?” AC: Yeah. And like, here’s my thing through all of this, when Bill Ackman throws a temper tantrum, or John Catsimatidis, which I think that’s the right pronunciation, throws a temper tantrum, I think people see that and it moves people toward Zohran. Like, wasn’t the whole point of Zohran’s election is that people are sick and tired of people like Bill Ackman paying little in taxes and having a massive apartment and having the influence that they do , right? Like that status quo that these people are screaming about that Zohran is going to disrupt is the very thing people don’t like. So yeah, I’m sure they’re going to have a meltdown. And they are welcome to move to Boca, and we will be thrilled to convert their brownstones and mega penthouses into multifamily dwellings to further make a dent in our housing crisis. AL: Going back to Cuomo. I know that some members, some city council members, were stripped from their roles in budget negotiations after backing Cuomo. Chi, what is the mood toward Cuomo among city councilors right now? CO: There’s a higher definite chance that Zohran becomes the next mayor, and regardless of where people fall within that politically ideological spectrum, I think people do want to be on good terms with the mayor, right? So I do think that there has been a vast distancing from Andrew Cuomo. AC: And the councilman makes a great point. And I think that is revealing of a bigger dynamic that I think is worth pointing out. People who are really watching New York politics are like, this is not like a real race, right? It is being treated as a very competitive general election for reasons that are divorced from the mechanics and the central dynamics of the race. Zohran had a winning message and a winning coalition, and Andrew Cuomo did not. None of those dynamics have changed. And you see the rest of the political class in New York very much understanding that. And we are thrilled for the attention and continue to go along with the ruse that Andrew Cuomo would like us to believe that this is still a competitive election and that he somehow has a path, but he does not. “We are thrilled for the attention and continue to go along with the ruse that Andrew Cuomo would like us to believe that this is still a competitive election and that he somehow has a path, but he does not.” AL: So far, only five Democrats representing New York City in Congress have endorsed Mamdani, the party’s nominee: Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Nydia Velázquez, who both endorsed him before he won the primary; Adriano Espaillat, Jerry Nadler, and Yvette Clarke, who endorsed him after he won. Gov. Kathy Hochul and Attorney General Letitia James got on board. Notably absent are Democrats’ top two leaders in Congress — Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, both of whom have addressed this in the last week or so and said they are still planning to weigh in. [ Editor’s note: On October 24, Politico reported that Rep. Hakeem Jeffries will be endorsing Zohran Mamdani . ] Many other Democrats have backed Cuomo, others whose candidates lost in the primary haven’t endorsed anyone else. What’s happening here? Are there two Democratic Parties? AC: So what is happening here is that the leaders, the elected leaders of the Democratic Party look so fucking stupid, I’m sorry. Honestly, it would’ve been better for them to just like, never endorse him and say like, “I’m just not going to make an endorsement in this race. I didn’t in the primary,” and like, move the fuck on. This is really the worst of both worlds. And just the message it sends. You hear from both of those leaders that we are a big-tent party, but apparently not so big if you have certain concerns about certain issues. The biggest discomfort with Zohran seems to be around foreign policy issues that have nothing to do with fucking New York City and also are so out of the mainstream of where the median Democratic voter is in New York City or beyond, it further reveals that there is a gap between the people who are calling all of the shots and regular voters. It only serves to put them, to make them seem more out of touch and more beholden not to rank-and-file Democrats but something else. AL: Chi, do you want to add anything?  CO: Sure, yeah. Their donors won’t let them. AL: Who? Which donors? Who are we talking about?  CO: All of them.  AL: Can you say more?  CO: Yeah. Probably BlackRock, the largest landlord in this country, probably AIPAC. Yeah, I think those donors will not let them endorse Zohran Mamdani for mayor. AC: Those sorts of donors give way more money at this point to the Republican Party and to Republican elected officials. Like, we are getting very little out of this. It shows a very — a view of politics and where to get money that is really out of date. CO: Yeah. It’s the same donors that don’t let them fight against Donald Trump, right?  AL: Alyssa, you brought up the foreign policy thing, and Chi, you’re mentioning AIPAC too. Mamdani has also faced criticism from his left and much on his right, particularly on this Israel–Gaza issue. Related Zohran Mamdani Shows Democrats How Not to Take the Bait Last week, he was asked during the mayoral debate about the ongoing saga around this phrase Mamdani himself has never used — “ globalize the intifada ” — but which many Democrats and pro-Israel critics have urged him to denounce. This is a phrase that many pro-Palestine advocates say simply calls for the end of the Israeli occupation – “intifada” is an Arabic word meaning uprising or resistance. But many pro-Israel Mamdani critics have turned it into a political cudgel to spread this fear that Mamdani won’t keep Jewish New Yorkers safe. I wrote about this last week , and you can find the story at The Intercept. Mamdani has drawn criticism for similar comments, including that he threw the movement for Palestine under the bus or that he’s a Zionist . Is there a “right” way for Dems to play this? Chi, I’ll start with you. CO: I don’t necessarily see it as a right way for Democrats to play this. I think Mamdani has 38 percent of support from the Jewish vote to Andrew Cuomo’s 42 percent. That’s basically equally matched. I believe for this issue, this is something that Jewish voters are definitely taking a look at, and a sizable amount support Mamdani and his efforts. AL: Alyssa, is there a right way for Democrats to play this issue?  AC: So it seems to me that his approach of not ever endorsing or supporting the flattening of Gaza was the right approach. This is an issue where you will never please everyone, but the majority of Jewish Democratic voters believe there there’s a genocide that’s been happening in the Middle East.  AL: Right. “What is popular and what is morally righteous are the same position right now.” AC: Are uncomfortable with the current no-strings-attached relationship with a radical right-wing Israeli government. And to me, when you’re looking at where’s the right place to be, I’m not sure it’s that hard. Because what is popular and what is morally righteous are the same position right now. AL: I’m going to switch gears a little bit and go back to early this year, January, February. It’s cold out. The mayoral race is just beginning. Everyone’s wondering if Eric Adams will even run again because he’s still under indictment. There are whispers about Cuomo, the assumption is that if he does jump in, everyone else might as well pack it up and go home. Why was he considered such a shoe-in?  CO: Cuomo did a really good job at creating this paper tiger effect on the political establishment. And it was very unclear as to what was going to happen within this mayoral race, especially with the amount of candidates that were jumping in and was able to secure some union endorsements from the get-go. There is this notion within our prior understanding of the New York City electorate, that a lot of voters who turn out in these elections — usual voters who turn out in these elections — will vote for the name that they know. And, you know, Andrew Cuomo was a name for older Black voters and Latino voters and outer borough voters, which was a strategy that Eric Adams used to win in 2021. So it created this effect that really galvanized a lot of the New York City press corp as well, right, political press corp to aid in Cuomo’s efforts of making him seem as unstoppable as he appeared. What was not taken into account was — and frankly could not be taken into account — was the movement that Zohran and New York City DSA were able to put together. It energized thousands, tens of thousands of new voters, folks who usually don’t come out and vote in New York City mayoral races. AC: Actually, when I look back, Zohran ran the most big-D Democratic campaign of any of the candidates in the primary. While many of us political consultants had our heads up our own asses, myself included, feeling very fearful, seeing the red wave that had happened in New York City and thinking — We forgot that this is a deeply Democratic town, and a liberal or progressive one at that. “We forgot that this is a deeply Democratic town, and a liberal or progressive one at that.” While the rest of the field was modulating on public safety or bringing in a more moderate tone to everything those campaigns were doing, Zohran ran a proud Democratic campaign, about making this city work for New Yorkers that was definitely democratic and the best sense of what being a classic Democrat was. And also understood — like they did something so well, but it was a very basic premise — that talking all of the time about the thing that people are thinking about and are keeping [them] up at night and are telling people is their number one concern is smart. The basic concept was not rocket science. And everyone else overcomplicating shit, created a real pathway for an insurgent candidate like Mamdani. AL: Thank you Council Member Chi Ossé and Democratic strategist Alyssa Cass, we really appreciate you joining us on the Intercept Briefing. CO: Thank you so much for having us.  AC: Thank you.  [Break] AL: We’re continuing the conversation about how the New York City mayoral race is shaping the future of the Democratic Party with Attorney Jim Walden. He’s endorsing Andrew Cuomo. Walden was running his own independent bid until early September, when he dropped out. His name will still be on the ballot in November — but he says he doesn’t want it there. Jim, welcome to The Intercept Briefing. Jim Walden: Thank you Akela. Thanks for having me. AL: We’re speaking to Jim on Thursday morning So we have been talking about the future of the Democratic Party. There’s been a lot of discussion in this past year since Kamala Harris lost the presidential election about a desire for a fresh start in the party. How does Cuomo fit into that future? JW: To the extent that the future of the Democratic [Party] as there’s a socialist future in there, I don’t think that Andrew Cuomo would ever be pushed that far. At the end of the day, he is a free market guy. He believes in the private sector. He believes that it’s critical for building, which is so important to the future of New York City. And so I think that it’ll be super interesting from the perspective of someone who’s been a long time independent to see across the country and in particular in New York, where the party goes. My guess is that there’s going to be a flirtation with socialism and maybe some populist push but that ultimately the party will come back closer to the center. AL: What are the policies that he’s running on right now that you see as emblematic of his potential to step into this leadership role at a critical moment in Democratic politics? JW: Housing in New York City, I can’t stress this enough, is central to solving the affordability crisis. And just today there was a number of press reports that came out that talked about the fact that the market for rent-stabilized housing, which represents about a million units across the city, that landlords are in financial distress and 1 in 5 buildings is underwater and they’re delaying things like repairs. And that is having a very, very significant impact on particularly Black and brown tenants who make up a significant portion of the rent-stabilized portfolio. “Andrew Cuomo is someone that has very close relationships with developers. He’s taken a lot of flack for that.” So Andrew Cuomo is someone that has very close relationships with developers. He’s taken a lot of flack for that. But you know, when you have a fire, you’re calling firefighters. When you have a criminal running down the street, you call the cops. We have a housing crisis that if we can’t solve it, it’s going to have collateral consequences across our economy. AL: So when you were running for mayor, you pitched yourself as the business community candidate, a reasonable moderate who knows how to work with the city’s elites and navigate the complexities of city government. And also as an outsider, who was someone who wasn’t a technocrat, someone who could appeal to some of the frustrations I think that people have had with the Democratic Party. What do you say to critics who might argue that the city’s billionaires are the people who most want Cuomo to win, and that this is a strategy to maintain the status quo? JW: That is an incredibly important question. And let me just double down in a show of self-awareness. I’ve said quite clearly that Andrew Cuomo getting into the race was one of the reasons that I decided to run because I thought that we needed change and we needed new leadership. So I’m not running away from any of my prior positions. Unfortunately, we have the candidates that we have, and I’ve said as clearly as I can that I think that they are all challenged candidates for different reasons, whether it’s experience, whether or not prior scandals and the like, but it was an uncomfortable choice that I had to make. But I made that choice, Akela, a long time ago. But it is actually really surprising to me that [Mamdani] has taken off the way that he has. And as I saw him ascend, I was actually one of the first people that predicted— I had run a whole Monte Carlo simulation before the Democratic primary in four of the 10 simulations, Mamdani won, and those were predictably accurate. And as I saw him rise, I saw him in some ways embrace more what I think are, you know, dangerous and radical policies. “They are all challenged candidates for different reasons, whether it’s experience, whether or not prior scandals and the like, but it was an uncomfortable choice that I had to make.” Akela Lacy: Yeah. So I want to go back to this idea of the status quo because — and I hear what you’re saying about your calculation both in jumping into the race and then removing yourself from the race because of the writing that you saw on the wall. But do you see Cuomo as a potential extension of that status quo? And if not, can you explain why not? Jim Walden: Status quo is, maybe we can sharpen that a little by saying that he’s an institutionalist, right? So I believe that it’s fair to say that, I’ll speak about me. I’m an institutionalist in the sense that for 23 years I’ve been bringing pro bono cases attacking city, state, and federal government for a lot of bad things that they’ve done to people. That doesn’t mean that I don’t support the institutions of democracy and our government. I do. And I believe that Andrew Cuomo is very much of the same ilk, although he may be more of an institutionalist because he’s been part of the governing elite, if you will. But at the same time I think that he will talk about changing the status quo, I think he’s going to change the status to quote completely when it comes to housing. I know for sure that his plan is — and again, to be clear, I’m not in the Cuomo campaign. I did this as a matter of my own personal politics and my own belief in what was the best for the city. I know that he’s going to do everything he could possibly do to start building things right away. And that’s what we need. I mean, if you think about the most recent data on housing, right? 2024 is the most complete picture that we have. Mayor Adams, to his credit, oversaw the building of about 25,000 rent-stabilized apartments. That’s great. That’s that’s a big bump from where we’ve been. The problem is that we lost 11,000 of older units that were being warehoused. And so 25,000 come on, 11,000 go off. We need somewhere between, depending on whose estimate you look at — My best estimate was 50,000 rent-stabilized units a year. Zohran Mamdani plan is only going to build 20,000 rent-stabilized apartments a year if it works. That’s something where I do trust Cuomo. AL: We have some breaking news as we’re speaking. New York City Mayor Eric Adams is endorsing Cuomo for mayor after joining him courtside at the Knicks game on Wednesday night. Can we get your reaction to that, Jim? JW: Yeah. So Adams endorsing Cuomo is really no surprise. You know, this kind of is a testament to again, all of the ways in which our political system is broken and in some ways dysfunctional. Eric Adams, whatever it was a month ago, said that Andrew Cuomo was a snake and a liar, and then they’re sitting at the Knicks game together, and then there’s an endorsement the next day. You know, I think that those sorts of things turn off people. They turn off voters. How can you have a positive reaction to that? “Those sorts of things turn off people. They turn off voters. How can you have a positive reaction to that?” But at the same time politics is politics, and at the end of the day it comes down to numbers. And with Cuomo and Sliwa in the race, Mamdani’s got a huge advantage. Just the math is the math. I mean, I’ve said this a million times and I don’t know how many people are listening to me on it. AL: You mentioned Adam doing this turn toward Cuomo after calling him a snake, but you had similar words for Cuomo in May. You described him as “a tired snake oil salesman, who’s on his last leg.” What is it about his policies that have made you change your mind? JW: So Cuomo while, I have deep, deep disagreements with him on a number of the things that have happened during the course of his career. He is a person that we need right now. Why? If you look at any projection — it doesn’t matter whether it’s inside the government or outside the government, unless some amazing, wonderful thing happens to the city — the minimum deficit that we’re going to have next year is $5 billion. And some of the estimates go up to something like nine, just next year. In the two years after that — again, unless there’s some sort of magic ointment that someone applies to our business community — the deficits are going to get much higher. And in that environment when we need so much, and we are already in a distressed situation with tax revenue, there’s going to have to be bold moves that pay the bills for all the things that we need to do. Related Zohran Mamdani Won’t Defund the Police. The Movement Can Grow With Him Anyway. And Zohran Mamdani, he has said more times than I can count that he wants to dismantle or defund the police. And then he’s running on a platform that he says “I’m not trying to defund the police,” but he is trying to defund the police. And this is one of the things that’s so frustrating to see low-information voters bite on this hook. Which is, he’s saying he’s going to keep the current level of police the same. We are down — depending on whose estimate you want to look at — the range is somewhere between 5,000 and 8,000 cops. No one’s really looking at the rate at which senior officers and detectives are filing for early retirement. “ We need more cops. And he’s not being honest about the fact that he really is defunding the police by holding the current headcount.” And there hasn’t been an enormous push to recruit. I think that at the end of the day, at the end of the year, if we end up flat, I think we’ll be lucky. But we need more cops. And he’s not being honest about the fact that he really is defunding the police by holding the current headcount. And earlier when he was describing his community, his department of community safety, I was standing next to him at a full mayoral forum where he said he was going to fund that by taking $1 billion out of the NYPD overtime budget. I was standing right there. And then when he put the PRO plan out, maybe after getting some initial criticism and feedback, he claims that he’s going to pay for it by raising taxes, both corporate and individual. So I believe that he wants to defund the police, and I believe everything that he’s been saying for years about his perspective on NYPD, you know, he said he was going to apologize. He then pivoted and said, well, I’m going to do it privately with individual officers. I’m not going to issue a blanket apology.  You know, I have a lot of cops who are friends and I can’t tell you the number of times, Akela, that cops have said to me, “Listen, if he’s going to be mayor and he’s going to change the CCRB, so the police commissioner has no power over choosing discipline for officers, I’m out of here.” So and those are two of the key reasons that cops are leaving the city is because the CCRB, it always was a broken agency. I had planned to get rid of it with something that was much more effective in terms of getting at the bad apples in NYPD and not victimizing cops that were trying to do their jobs and got into bad situations that they tried their best to control, but still had a complaint filed against them. So the CCRB, the extent to which they’re now being forced into overtime shifts that are akin to a indentured servitude at times, and lower starting salaries than is being competitive with other states outside of New York. That’s why we’re losing active-duty officers because it’s like, I don’t need this anymore. So that’s one example of a policy that I think is dangerous. AL: There’s more that I can talk about but we’re getting close to time. So, Jim Walden, thank you so much for joining us on the Intercept Briefing. Really appreciate your time. JW: Thank you for having me. AL: That does it for this episode of The Intercept Briefing.  We want to hear from you.  Share your story with us at 530-POD-CAST. That’s 530-763-2278. You can also email us at podcasts at the intercept dot com.  This episode was produced by Laura Flynn and Maia Hibbett. Sumi Aggarwal is our executive producer. Ben Muessig is our editor-in-chief. Chelsey B. Coombs is our social and video producer. Fei Liu is our product and design manager. Nara Shin is our copy editor. Will Stanton mixed our show. Legal review by David Bralow.  Slip Stream provided our theme music. You can support our work at theintercept.com/join . Your donation, no matter the amount, makes a real difference. If you haven’t already, please subscribe to The Intercept Briefing wherever you listen to podcasts. And tell all of your friends about us. Better yet, leave us a rating or a review to help other listeners find our reporting. Until next time, I’m Akela Lacy.  Thanks for listening. The post The Struggle for the Future of the New York Democratic Party appeared first on The Intercept .

Amazon sold cloud-computing services to two Israeli weapons manufacturers whose munitions helped devastate Gaza, according to internal company materials obtained by The Intercept. Amazon Web Services has furnished the Israeli government — including its military and intelligence agencies — with a suite of state-of-the-art data processing and storage services since 2021 as part of its controversial Project Nimbus deal. Last year, The Intercept revealed a provision in that contract requiring Amazon and Google, the other Nimbus vendor, to sell cloud services to Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and Israeli Aerospace Industries, two leading Israeli weapons firms. New internal financial data and emails between Amazon personnel and their Israeli corporate and governmental clients show that Amazon has consistently provided software to both Rafael and IAI in 2024 and 2025 — periods during which Israel’s military was using their products to indiscriminately kill civilians and destroy civil infrastructure. Rafael purchased artificial intelligence technologies made available through Amazon Web Services, including the state-of-the-art large language model Claude, developed by AI startup Anthropic. The materials reviewed by The Intercept also indicate Amazon sold cloud-computing services to Israel’s nuclear program and offices administering the West Bank, where Israeli military occupation, population displacement, and settlement construction is widely considered illegal under international law. Amazon proclaims broad commitments to international human rights values, like most of its Big Tech peers. “We’re committed to identifying, assessing, prioritizing, and addressing adverse human rights impacts connected to our business,” the company’s Global Human Rights Principles website states. “Within Amazon’s own operations, we deploy a variety of mechanisms to conduct due diligence, assessing and responding to risks across the company,” including “human rights impact assessments to assess risks specific to Amazon businesses, including in the sectors and the countries where we operate.” Amazon declined to comment or respond to a list of detailed questions, including whether it conducted a human rights impact assessment pertaining to selling its services to weapons companies whose products are used in a war widely assessed to be genocidal . Rafael, Israel Aerospace Industries, and the Israeli Ministry of Defense did not respond to a request for comment. It’s unclear how much money Rafael and IAI paid Amazon for its services. The documents reviewed by The Intercept show that Amazon sold its cloud-computing to Rafael at a discounted rate, though the exact percentage is not disclosed. The materials cite a 35 percent discount for services sold to the Israeli Ministry of Defense, a major Project Nimbus customer; it’s unclear if this rate is provided to Rafael and IAI as well. Rafael was founded in 1948 as a governmental weapons research lab and, like its American equivalents at Raytheon or Lockheed, has become synonymous with Israeli militarism. Today, the state-owned company manufactures a diverse arsenal of missiles, bombs, drones, and other weaponry for both domestic use and international export. The corporation has thrived since Hamas’s October 7 attacks, reporting record revenues in both 2023 and 2024 that it attributed to Israel’s bombardment of Gaza. “2024 was a record year for Rafael, during the longest and most complex multi-front war in Israel’s history,” CEO Yoav Turgeman said last year, referring to the ongoing war with Hamas and related regional conflicts. “Rafael played a significant role in Israel’s military achievements in offense, intelligence and defense.” IAI, another state-owned weapons firm, is best known for co-developing Israel’s anti-rocket Iron Dome system alongside Rafael. The company also manufactures a wide array of military aircraft, including its Heron line of drones — which the company has boasted about being used to great effect in Israel’s war on Gaza. A November 2023 promotional item about IAI’s drones published in the Jerusalem Post noted that “In the face of the October 7 challenges, the HERON UAS demonstrated its strategic importance by providing real-time intelligence, supporting targeted acquisitions, and aiding in the neutralization of threats.” Missiles and other weapon systems built by Rafael and IAI have been used against Palestinians throughout the Gaza war. One of the most prominent Rafael weapons is its line of missile guidance kits dubbed SPICE: “Smart, Precise Impact, and Cost-Effective.” The SPICE technology converts “dumb” 1,000 or 2,000-pound bombs into “smart” guided munitions. In September 2024, Israel bombed a refugee camp — previously designated by the government as a “ safe zone ” for displaced Palestinians — with what weapons analysts later assessed was a 2,000 pound SPICE-guided bomb . The attack, condemned by the United Nations as “unconscionable,” killed at least 19 Palestinians, including women and children , with a massive explosion that burned, shredded, and in some cases buried those who’d sought shelter at the site. Fragments of a SPICE guidance kit were found amid the wreckage of a December 2024 airstrike on a house in Central Gaza that reportedly killed 12 civilians. People inspect the site following Israeli strikes on a tent camp sheltering displaced people in the Al-Mawasi area in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, on Sept. 10, 2024.   Photo: Majdi Fathi/NurPhoto via Getty Images Retired Air Force operator and weapons targeting expert Wes Bryant described Rafael and IAI as “highly integral to Israel’s defense industrial complex,” telling The Intercept both companies are implicated in killing civilians. Israel has been criticized for its frequent use of 2,000-pound bombs in Gaza, one of the densest urban areas in the world. “It could level multiple large houses in the average suburban American neighborhood,” Bryant explained. “Ideally the only time they should be used in urban warfare is when we have identified a large and/or hardened enemy structure and confirmed it is entirely in use by the enemy and has no civilian function nor civilians within or around it at risk.” Rafael’s electro-optically guided Spike family of missiles are designed to both punch through and destroy heavily armored tanks or kill humans, and can be fired from portable ground-launchers in addition to drones or other vehicles. Some Spike missiles use “shaped charge” warheads, which slice into targets with a cone of scalding metal launched from the weapon as it detonates. In 2009, a former Pentagon official described the Spike to Haaretz as “a special missile that is made to make very high-speed turns, so if you have a target that is moving and running away from you, you can chase him with the weapon.” Rafael marketing materials note one variant “can be used in urban combat against structural targets found in urban settings for in-structure detonation.” Arms experts have at times attributed devastating, widespread shrapnel wounds inflicted upon Palestinian civilians to Spike missiles, which can be packed with tiny pieces of tungsten. When a tungsten-loaded Spike weapon hits its target, the 3-millimeter metal cubes blast outward in a 65-foot radius, lacerating blood vessels, puncturing organs, and shredding the flesh of anyone nearby, according to analysts . In April 2024, an investigation by The Times of London revealed Israel used a drone-launched Spike missile manufactured by Rafael to kill seven aid workers with World Central Kitchen. U.N. special rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories Francesca Albanese called for indictments following the attack, echoing international condemnations and demands for an inquiry into whether the airstrike constituted a war crime. “Though the IDF does not release numbers of munitions utilized in the war in Gaza, SPIKE missiles have been used extensively and have been attributed by many investigations to the death of civilians, including children,” said Bryant. “It is likely that Israel has used dozens, if not hundreds, of SPIKE missiles throughout Gaza since the outset of the conflict.” Both Rafael and IAI supply the Israeli military with so-called loitering munitions: suicide drones that can hover for extended periods while scanning for targets, then quickly slam into the ground and detonate an onboard explosive. Both companies’ weapons are frequently highlighted when the Israeli military–industrial apparatus wants to flag its technology supremacy. In July, Rafael posted a promotional video using footage of its Firefly suicide drone killing an apparently unarmed person walking down the street in an unidentified area of Gaza. Suicide drone attacks have also been documented in the Occupied West Bank; a December 2023 video captured a Firefly explosive descending into a dense courtyard. Israel’s military similarly promoted the use of the shoulder-fired Matador rocket, co-developed by Rafael, in a March 2024 video reported by Israeli outlet Ynet: “In the clip, one of the terrorists opened fire from a room inside an apartment — and the use of a Matador missile targeting him precisely to eliminate the threat.” The outlet noted “a woman and two children” were in the adjoining room, but claimed they were not harmed in the missile attack against their home. The Israeli military did not respond to a request for comment. Read our complete coverage Israel’s War on Gaza The documents show that Rafael acquired generative artificial intelligence tools through Amazon. In 2024, the firm sought to begin testing generative AI services made available through Amazon’s Bedrock service, which provides customers with machine-learning tools, including those made by third-party firms. According to the files, Rafael wanted to use both Amazon’s Titan G1 large language model and Claude, the advanced LLM model created by Anthropic. Like its competitor OpenAI , Anthropic recently pivoted toward military contracting, announcing a $200 million deal with the Pentagon in July. Anthropic’s permissible use policy prohibits the use of its technology to “Produce, modify, design, or illegally acquire weapons,” and to “Design or develop weaponization and delivery processes for the deployment of weapons.” It’s unclear how the use of Claude by Rafael — a company that exists to design, develop, and deliver weapons — could be in compliance with this policy. The documents reviewed by The Intercept indicate Rafael was able to purchase access to these models, but do not reveal how they were used. Anthropic did not respond to questions about Rafael’s usage of Claude, or whether it would permit a weapons company to use its services despite an apparent ban on exactly that. In a statement, spokesperson Eduardo Maia Silva said, “Anthropic services are available to users, including governments, in most countries and regions around the world under our standard commercial Usage Policy. Users are required to comply with our  Usage Policies  which include restrictions and prohibitions around how Claude can be deployed.” Project Nimbus has been a military program from its start. The Israeli Ministry of Finance declared in 2021 that its purpose was “to provide the government, the defense establishment and others with an all encompassing cloud solution.” Google, Amazon’s co-contractor on the project, has repeatedly denied that Nimbus involves “highly sensitive, classified, or military workloads relevant to weapons or intelligence services,” while Amazon has generally refrained from commenting at all. A separate internal Amazon document obtained by The Intercept shows that the company was quietly lobbying Israel to allow it to handle classified material from the country’s defense and intelligence community. The document, an overview of Israel’s regulatory landscape, explained that the country’s military and spy agencies were reluctant to migrate classified data onto Amazon’s cloud servers. But the paper also notes that Amazon was trying to influence state regulators into changing this position, and had begun working with one unnamed, major government body to bring some of its classified materials onto AWS. Portions of the internal financial materials indicate exactly which Amazon services the Israeli military and state-owned weapons firms use. The purchases include dozens of networking, storage, and security tools, including Elastic Compute Cloud, which lets customers run software in virtual computers hosted by Amazon. Multiple documents show the Israeli Ministry of Defense purchased access to Amazon Rekognition, the company’s face-recognition tool, including an unspecified “OSINT,” or open-source intelligence, project by the Israeli military’s Central Command. Rekognition has previously been criticized for its lower accuracy rates with women and people of color; in 2020, the company announced a self-imposed yearlong moratorium on police use of Rekognition , citing the need for “stronger regulations to govern the ethical use of facial recognition technology.” The system, according to Amazon, is capable not only of identifying faces, but also a range of emotions including “fear.” The documents show the Israeli military has also used Amazon technology to test large language models, though the specific models or applications are not mentioned. One Israeli military username includes the number 9900, a possible sign of use by the IDF’s Unit 9900, a geospatial intelligence unit that aided in planning strikes in Gaza, including through the use of a spy satellite developed by IAI. Unit 9900 also purchased cloud services from Microsoft, according to a January report by The Guardian and +972 Magazine. The documents indicate that another Amazon customer through its Nimbus contract is the Israeli state-operated Soreq Nuclear Research Center, a scientific installation constructed in cooperation with the United States in the 1950s. Although Israel’s nuclear weapons arsenal is technically secret and unacknowledged by its government, Soreq operates in the open, ostensibly part of the country’s civilian atomic energy program. Unlike Israel’s highly classified Negev Nuclear Research Center, Soreq is not believed to be a major contributor to the country’s weapons capabilities. A 1987 Pentagon study , however, stated the Soreq installation “runs the full nuclear gamut of activities …required for nuclear weapons design and fabrication.” A 2002 report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute noted “The Soreq Center shares a security zone with the Palmikhim AB,” an Israeli Air Force base, “from where missiles are assembled and test launched into the Mediterranean Sea.” A separate document briefly references as AWS users unspecified government offices in “Judea and Samaria,” Israel’s term for the West Bank, which it has illegally occupied since 1967. Ioannis Kalpouzos, a visiting professor at Harvard Law School and an expert on human rights law and laws of war, told The Intercept that Amazon’s work with Israeli weapons makers could potentially create liability under international law depending on “whether it is foreseeable that it will lead to the commission of international crimes.” “There is no need for genocidal intent for accessorial liability in aiding the principal to commit genocide,” Kalpouzos said. Related Google Worried It Couldn’t Control How Israel Uses Project Nimbus, Files Reveal It’s unclear to what extent Amazon is aware of how its services are being used by the companies that build Israel’s bombs or the military that drops them. The Intercept previously reported internal anxieties amid the bidding process at Google, where leadership fretted that the project was structured in such a way that the company would be kept in the dark about how exactly its technology would be used, potentially in violation of human rights standards. While servicing the Israeli government includes plenty of mundane applications — say transportation, schools, or hospitals — in addition to its military, there’s little nuance in the operations of Rafael and IAI. Even if Amazon lacks the ability to conduct oversight of these customers, Bryant said there is little ambiguity when it comes to the purpose of their business: building and selling weapons. “I don’t see how Amazon can make a claim of not being complicit in killing,” said Bryant, who previously led civilian harm assessments at the Pentagon, “even if they don’t fully know what everything is used for.” The post As Israel Bombed Gaza, Amazon Did Business With Its Bomb-Makers appeared first on The Intercept .

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