WorldAssociated PressIsrael strikes Gaza tunnels as truce efforts remain elusive
The Israeli military unleashed another heavy wave of airstrikes Monday on the Gaza Strip, saying it destroyed militant tunnels and the homes of nine Hamas commanders. International diplomacy to end the weeklong war that has killed hundreds appeared to make little headway. Israel has said it will press on for now with its attacks against Hamas, the militant group that rules Gaza, and the United States signaled it would not pressure the two sides for a cease-fire even as President Joe Biden said he supported one.
U.S.Raleigh News and ObserverOn-duty police officer sexually assaulted by gas station manager, Georgia cops say
The manager of a Georgia gas station is accused of sexually assaulting a police officer who was on duty and in uniform. According to the Hogansville Police Department, Prilesh Navinchandra Thakkar “attempted to forcefully commit an indecent act on an on duty female police officer.” The officer was conducting a business check on May 11 at the Hop In service station along state Highway 54 when the 300-pound manager grabbed her and pulled her behind the counter, WAGA reported.
WorldThe WeekBiden, harboring low expectations, wants Israel and Gaza to give 'calm' a chance
President Biden is trying to tackle a number of big problems, and he pretty clearly was hoping Mideast peace wasn't going to be one of them. But the long-simmering conflict between Israel and Hamas erupted again last week, more than 200 Palestinians and 10 Israelis are dead, and the Israeli airstrikes on Gaza and Hamas rockets for Israel show no sign of letting up. Biden said Monday that he had voiced support for a ceasefire in a call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but he isn't publicly pressuring Israel to accept a pause in fighting and Netanyahu has made clear he's not currently interested.
U.S.Associated PressLawyer: US approves release of oldest Guantanamo prisoner
A 73-year-old from Pakistan who is the oldest prisoner at the Guantanamo Bay detention center was notified on Monday that he has been approved for release after more than 16 years in custody at the U.S. base in Cuba, his lawyer said. Saifullah Paracha, who has been held on suspicion of ties to al-Qaida but never charged with a crime, was cleared by the prisoner review board along with two other men, said Shelby Sullivan-Bennis, who represented him at his hearing in November. As is customary, the notification did not provide detailed reasoning for the decision and concluded only that Paracha is “not a continuing threat” to the U.S., Sullivan-Bennis said.
WorldBBCAustralian businessman trapped in India dies from Covid
An Australian man has died of Covid in Delhi, after getting infected around the time Australia banned citizens in India from returning home. Govind Kant, a Sydney businessman, died on Sunday, his company said. Mr Kant is believed to be the second Australian to have died in India amid a temporary travel ban imposed after a devastating second wave.
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Woman accused of killing her 2 kids with meat cleaver after argument with husband
A woman threatened to stab her husband over an argument about money to move to Japan before she allegedly killed their two children with a meat cleaver in a suburban Phoenix apartment, police said Sunday.
WorldReutersHK suspends operations at representative office in Taiwan as tensions rise
HONG KONG/TAIPEI (Reuters) -Hong Kong government's suspended on Tuesday operations at its representative office in Taiwan in a sign of escalating diplomatic tension between the global financial hub and the democratically ruled island that Beijing claims. Tension between Hong Kong's Beijing-backed government and Taiwan have risen since pro-democracy protests erupted in Hong Kong in 2019 and China responded by imposing a sweeping national security law in the city that prompted many activists to leave, some for Taiwan. A Hong Kong government representative did not provide an explanation for the decision to halt operations at the Hong Kong Economic, Trade and Cultural Office, adding only that the decision was not related to the recent rise in coronavirus cases in Taiwan.
WorldThe Telegraph'This is our land': Russia warns West against staking claims in Arctic
Russia has warned the West against staking claims in the Arctic ahead of an international meeting on the future of the region, where strategic competition has reached levels not seen since the end of the Cold War. Moscow has recently increased its military presence in the area while also seeking to exploit mineral resources and new shipping routes that have opened up as the ice melts. The US, several Nordic countries, and China have also made moves to protect their own interests in the High North.
WorldAssociated PressBangladesh arrests journalist known for unearthing graft
Police in Bangladesh's capital have arrested a journalist known for her strong reporting against official corruption in the South Asian country where journalists are often threatened with dire consequences for professional work. Rozina Islam, a senior reporter with the country's leading Bengali-language Prothom Alo daily newspaper, was confined for more than five hours till late Monday in a room of a personal assistant of the secretary of the Ministry of Health, said her younger sister Sabina Parvin. A secretary is the top bureaucrat of a ministry, and the room was inside the Bangladesh Secretariat, the downtown Dhaka premises where almost all government ministries are located.
U.S.The StateElizabeth City councilman says footage shows deputy urinating outside Black funeral home
An Elizabeth City councilman says he has captured footage of what he says is a deputy urinating on his funeral home property — an act he considers retaliation for his outspoken views about Andrew Brown Jr.'s shooting death last month. Brown, 42, was shot and killed April 21 when Pasquotank County deputies arrived at his Elizabeth City home to serve search and arrest warrants based on a yearlong drug investigation. Councilman Gabriel Adkins, who is Black, said a uniformed deputy or deputies came to his business on North Road Street on both Friday and Saturday nights, urinating at night while in sight of his surveillance camera.
WorldThe WeekResearchers: Chinese businessman is 'linchpin' of disinformation network pushing COVID, election falsehoods
Guo Wengui, a Chinese businessman living in self-exile in New York, is at the center of a vast online network of media websites and social media accounts that spread false claims about coronavirus vaccines, election fraud, and the baseless QAnon conspiracy theory, researchers from the Graphika network analysis company write in a new report released Monday. Guo is close to Stephen Bannon, the onetime chief strategist to former President Donald Trump; last summer, Bannon was arrested on Guo's yacht on federal fraud charges.
PoliticsReutersTrump, House Democrats near agreement on Deutsche Bank subpoenas
Former President Donald Trump and Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives said on Monday they are near an agreement to resolve disputes concerning congressional subpoenas of his financial records from Deutsche Bank AG. In a filing in federal court in Manhattan, lawyers for Trump and the Democrats said they believed they were "close to an agreement" in talks concerning the scope of the subpoenas and a process for resolving privacy concerns. They asked a judge for another 30 days to continue talks. Deutsche Bank, Trump's main bank, said in the same filing that both sides would invite it to raise any concerns "at an appropriate time."
WorldThe TelegraphPrincess Diana gave me information in faked bank statements, claims Martin Bashir
Martin Bashir told a BBC inquiry that information contained in faked bank statements came from Princess Diana, The Telegraph can disclose. The mocked-up bank statements are at the heart of an inquiry led by Lord Dyson, the Master of the Rolls, into the conduct of Bashir in securing his world exclusive interview with the princess in 1995. Lord Dyson has completed his detailed report, due to be published this week and expected to contain damning criticism of Bashir, 58, who resigned as the BBC's religion editor on grounds of ill-health ahead of its publication.
U.S.Associated PressFormer jailer seeks clemency for one death row inmate
If Richard Moore is executed, he will have some say in how he goes — the electric chair or the firing squad. Moore is one of three prisoners on South Carolina's death row who have run out of appeals in the past six months and could be among the first to face the grim choice under a new state law. The state Supreme Court set and then stayed the prisoners' executions after the Corrections Department said it didn't have the drugs needed to carry out lethal injections.
WorldBBCJust 20 firms behind more than half of single-use plastic waste - study
The research - carried out by a consortium including the London School of Economics - looked at which companies are at the base of the plastic supply chain and make polymers, the building blocks of all plastics. It names 20 petrochemical companies which it says are the source of 55 per cent of the world's single-use plastic waste. The companies include ExxonMobil, Dow and Sinopec.
WorldReutersNATO attempts to appease Serbian concerns over Croatian troops in Kosovo
NATO sought on Monday to assuage Serbian concerns over the deployment of Croatian troops to Kosovo, stressing they were bound by exactly the same rules as all other troops of the alliance's KFOR peacekeeping force in the Balkan country. "All troops provided by NATO allies and partner countries to our operation in Kosovo operate under ... a well established framework, which is set out by the UN resolution 1244," NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters after meeting Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic in Brussels.
WorldAssociated PressEXPLAINER: Are Israel, Hamas committing war crimes in Gaza?
More than a week into their fourth war, Israel and the Hamas militant group already face allegations of possible war crimes in Gaza. Israel says Hamas is using Palestinian civilians as human shields, while critics say Israel is using disproportionate force. The firing of hundreds of imprecise rockets into Israel by Hamas and other Palestinian groups is fairly clear-cut.
U.S.Associated PressMan cuts own throat, dies after verdict in federal courtroom
Federal authorities say a man on trial in Fargo, North Dakota, slashed his own throat in the courtroom Monday and died. North Dakota U.S. Marshal Dallas Carlson said the incident happened after a jury returned a partial guilty verdict against the man, who had faced terrorizing-related charges. Carlson said the man had a sharp instrument that might have been made of plastic.
HealthThe TelegraphPost-menopausal women report periods coming back after having Covid vaccine
Researchers are investigating the reports to see if the disruption to the menstrual cycle is caused by the jabs. No proof has yet been found linking the inoculations to the unusual reproductive symptoms, but a growing body of anecdotal evidence has led scientists to begin probing the reports. Professor Tim Spector, an epidemiologist at King's College London, said earlier this month that the symptom-tracker app ZOE was monitoring reports of period-related side-effects.
WorldAssociated PressIsrael, Hamas trade fire in Gaza as war rages on
Israel carried out a wave of airstrikes on what it said were militant targets in Gaza, leveling a six-story building, and militants fired dozens of rockets into Israel on Tuesday. Palestinians across the region observed a general strike as the war, now in its second week, showed no signs of abating. Heavy fighting broke out May 10 when Gaza's militant Hamas rulers fired long-range rockets toward Jerusalem in support of Palestinian protests there against Israel's heavy-handed policing of the Al-Aqsa mosque compound, a flashpoint holy site sacred to Jews and Muslims, and the threatened eviction of dozens of Palestinian families by Jewish settlers.
WorldAssociated PressRansomware hits AXA units in Asia, Irish healthcare
The Thai affiliate of Paris-based insurance company AXA said Tuesday it is investigating a ransomware attack by Russian-speaking cybercriminals that has affected operations in Thailand, Malaysia, Hong Kong and the Philippines. Meanwhile, a cyberattack on a public health provider in New Zealand took down information systems across five hospitals, forcing staff to cancel some elective surgeries and creating all sorts of other problems. In Bangkok, Krungthai AXA said it has formed a team with AXA's Inter Partner Assistance to urgently investigate the problem.
PoliticsThe IndependentRudy Giuliani complains he’s being treated like drug cartel head amid reports Trump has abandoned him
Rudy Giuliani has complained he is being treated like the head of a drug cartel head amid reports that Donald Trump has abandoned him. Lawyers for Mr Giuliani have condemned prosecutors for the 28 April raid by FBI agents on his New York home and criticised them for gaining electronic access to his accounts. “Unfortunately for Giuliani, and even more unfortunately for the attorney-client privilege and executive deliberation privilege, and the public's perception that those privileges are real, the SDNY simply chose to treat a distinguished lawyer as if he was the head of a drug cartel or a terrorist, in order to create maximum prejudicial coverage of both Giuliani, and his most well-known client – the former President of the United States,” it stated.
WorldBBCIndia coronavirus: Tracing a family’s journey to save a life
Anoop Saxena, 59, was one of hundreds of thousands Indians who fell sick with Covid at the end of April. What followed over the next few days was just one example of a family's desperate search for help, wherever they could find it. There are many thousands more across India, just like this.
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Kid reporter who interviewed Obama dies at 23
The student reporter who gained national attention when he interviewed then-President Barack Obama at the White House in 2009 has died of natural causes, his family says.
PoliticsAssociated PressEXPLAINER: The Supreme Court takes a major abortion case
The Supreme Court agreed on Monday to decide a major abortion case that could dramatically alter decades of rulings on abortion rights and eventually lead to dramatic restrictions on abortion access. It's been nearly 50 years since the court announced in its landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that women have a constitutional right to abortion. COULD THIS BE THE CASE THAT OVERTURNS ROE V. WADE?
“We are a nation bobbing in multiple crises. Not one of them involves people taking COVID-19 too seriously.”
“The threat is increasingly concentrated among people who are vulnerable by choice.”
“This announcement would be very welcome if not for one big problem: There is no requirement for proof of vaccination.”
“Joining the protected vaccinated minority, which we hope will rapidly become the majority, is simple.”
“Instead of taking giant steps. I think we should be taking small steps toward the same goal.”