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Friday, November 10, 2023

11/10 WAKE-UP CALL: Israel OKs Four Hour War Pauses


In a crucial breakthrough for the global effort to provide humanitarian aid to Gaza, Israel has agreed to daily four-hour pauses in fighting across northern Gaza, the White House said Thursday. U.S. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said the Israelis had committed to announcing each four-hour window at least three hours in advance starting Thursday. Israel also was opening a second corridor for civilians to flee the areas being pounded by Israel's military campaign aimed at wiping out Hamas after the brutal Oct. 7 attack on border communities, with a coastal road joining the territory’s main north-south highway, he said. By Thursday night, though, there was still no sign the fighting had stopped or confirmation of such plans from Israel,Reuters reported.

➤ISRAELI TROOPS ADVANCE IN GAZA CITY:  Israeli troops advanced toward the heart of Gaza City. The military said it was closing in on Hamas’s intelligence and operational hub, which sits near the largest hospital in the Gaza Strip, as well as kindergartens and mosques, and includes a war room for directing fighting, a large training ground and munitions factories. The militant group couldn’t be reached for comment. Israeli officials also said 80,000 northern Gaza residents traveled south Thursday, the largest movement so far in the five days since a humanitarian corridor was opened. The U.S. and other allies have pressed Israel to allow more humanitarian aid and safe passage to trapped civilians. The White House said that Israel had agreed to daily four-hour pauses in its bombardment of northern Gaza. The U.S. and Israel have rejected calls for a cease-fire. Separately, the Israel-Hamas war has undercut Ukraine’s push for a high-level summit to bolster support for its fight with Russia, Western diplomats said.

➤ISRAEL NOT SEEKING OCCUPATION: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday his country does not seek to conquer, occupy or govern Gaza after its war against Hamas but a "credible force" would be needed to enter the Palestinian enclave if necessary to prevent the emergence of militant threats. Netanyahu's comments this week suggesting that Israel would be responsible for Gaza security indefinitely drew pushback from the United States, Israel's main ally. Washington has said it would oppose Israeli post-war occupation of Gaza, where Israel has waged a bombing campaign to destroy the enclave's Hamas rulers after militants rampaged through southern Israeli communities on Oct. 7 in an attack that Israel says killed 1,400 people. Speaking to U.S. television's Fox News on Thursday, Netanyahu said: "We don't seek to conquer Gaza, we don't seek to occupy Gaza, and we don't seek to govern Gaza."

➤DEFECTIVE DRONE FAILED TO EXPLODE: A defective drone in Iraq may have helped keep America from being dragged deeper into a widening Middle East conflict. The drone, which was launched at the Erbil air base by an Iranian-backed militia before sunrise on Oct. 26, penetrated U.S. air defenses and crashed into the second floor of the barracks housing American troops at about 5 a.m, according to two U.S. officials familiar with the matter. But the device laden with explosives failed to detonate and in the end only one service member suffered a concussion from the impact, said the officials, who asked to remain anonymous to speak freely about the attack. The U.S. had got lucky, they added, as the drone could have caused carnage had it exploded. The incident was among at least 40 separate drone and rocket attacks that have been launched at U.S. forces by Iranian-backed militias in Iraq and Syria over the past three weeks in response to American support for Israel in the Gaza war, according to Pentagon data and the two U.S. officials.

➤MEDIA SEES ATROCITIES: The Israeli consulate in New York City held a screening on Thursday night of the footage from the October 7 terror attack - one of 75 screenings held so far to demonstrate the brutality of the onslaught. The screening comes amid calls from anti-Israel critics for 'proof' that innocent civilians were murdered and raped at the hands of Hamas. Gal Gadot, the Wonder Woman actress, held a screening of the film in Los Angeles on Wednesday night - which sparked wild fights outside the venue, the Museum of Tolerance. 

The Israeli actress was not at the screening, but multiple people were detained after brawls outside between pro-Palestine and pro-Israel factions. At the screening no photos or videos were allowed or distributed. Around 20 journalists were present. The film has been screened in an effort to counter the skepticism expressed by some, who have claimed the October 7 attack was 'fake news' and defended Hamas as 'freedom fighters'. 

➤WAPO CAVES..PULLS POLITICAL CARTOON: A political cartoon titled 'Human Shields', which depicted a Hamas terrorist strapped to women and children questioning civilian deaths caused by Israel, was removed by the Washington Post after backlash from readers. The cartoon was published online and in the newspaper's Wednesday print edition on November 8. Drawn by cartoonist Michael Ramirez, the caricature was sharply criticized by some who saw it as a discriminatory portrayal of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, although it is unclear if Haniyeh was the intended subject.

➤JUDGE..COUNTRY DROWNING IN MASS SHOOTINGS: A federal magistrate judge Thursday denied bail for Cornell University student Patrick Dai after noting that violent antisemitic threats he allegedly made and his apparent struggles with mental health issues reminded her of the profiles of some past mass shooters. "This country is drowning in mass shootings," said U.S. Magistrate Judge Thérèse Wiley Dancks said in federal court in Syracuse Thursday. Some mass shooters have utilized online threats and communications before their crimes, Wiley Dancks said. "It was not unlike what was happening here," she said. Dai, 21, is accused of posting online a series of threats that included plans to attack a kosher dining hall at Cornell and to murder and behead Jewish people and students. The postings came from someone using online monikers that included "hamas soldier." Dai admitted to the threats in a seven-hour interview with the FBI, prosecutors say.

➤JOE MANCHIN WON'T RUN FOR RE-ELECTION:  The West Virginia Democrat’s decision is expected to hurt his party’s effort to hold on to the Senate, which they currently control 51-49. The Mountain State is considered one of Republicans’ top pickup opportunities, along with Montana and Ohio, and Manchin was seen as the only Democrat with a shot at retaining the seat. The centrist senator from a solidly Republican state has been a pivotal deal maker and considered becoming an independent, citing increasing frustration with both parties.


➤POLLING..NATIONS SOURS ON BIDEN: CNN political director David Chalian said that the latest poll numbers still show President Biden is in trouble despite the success that Democrats scored on Election Night on Tuesday. “Tonight is undoubtedly a good night for the Democrats. There’s no doubt about it,” Chalian told viewers on Tuesday after the network announced the re-election of Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear as well as the Ohio referendum in which voters cast ballots in favor of a constitutional provision protecting abortion rights. But Chalian pivoted to Biden, whose disapproval rating soared to 61%, according to a new CNN poll. Chalian said that “the nation has soured” on the 80-year-old president, who is presiding over an economy hamstrung by high inflation. Biden’s mental acuity and his readiness to take on the stresses of the job have also been called into question, particularly after a series of verbal gaffes and physical stumbles.

➤PELOSI ASSAILANT ON TRIAL: The man on trial for bludgeoning Paul Pelosi in his San Francisco home with a hammer truly believed he was trying to save the world from a secret cabal of high-profile pedophiles, his defense attorney told a San Francisco court Thursday. At the opening of the federal trial against David DePape his legal team said they won’t dispute that he hit Pelosi — an incident caught on police bodycam — but they would explain he was motivated by internet conspiracy theories that the “liberal ruling class” spread lies and abused children.

Defense attorney Jodi Linker told jurors: “This is not a ‘whodunnit’, but what the government fails to acknowledge is the ‘why-dunnit’. And the why matters. The why is what makes this a federal case.” DePape faces two charges; attempted kidnapping of a federal official and assault on the immediate family member of a federal official in retaliation for performance of their duties.

➤MORTGAGE RATES FALL: The interest rate for a mortgage is finally coming down a bit. The average nationwide fixed-rate mortgage fell to 7.5% from 7.76% in the week that ended yesterday. It was the second weekly decline in a row after seven consecutive weeks of increases.

➤BUDGET CRISIS LOOMS AGAIN: For the third time this year, the House of Representatives is toying with the idea of shutting down the government rather than approving the money to keep it running. Republican leaders in the House this week pulled two out of 12 bills that would authorize government spending beyond next Friday.

➤BRUCE WILLIS’ DEMENTIA IS ‘REALLY AGGRESSIVE: Tallulah Willis appeared on Wednesday’s (November 8th) episode of The Drew Barrymore Show and shared a health update on her father, Bruce Willis, after he was diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia earlier this year. “What’s going on with my dad — he has a really aggressive cognitive disease, a form of dementia that’s very rare,” Tallulah said. She also commented on how she’s coped with the changes. “A really beautiful way for me to heal through this is becoming like an archaeologist to my dad’s stuff, his world, his little trinkets and doodads,” Tallulah said. When Barrymore asked about the current state of the Die Hard actor’s health, she replied, "He is the same, which, I think, in this regard I’ve learned is the best thing you can ask for. I see love when I'm with him, and it's my dad and he loves me."

➤DeNIRO ASSISTANT AWARDED $1.2M:  Robert De Niro's production company Canal Productions has been found liable of gender discrimination against his former assistant Graham Chase Robinson - and is ordered to pay her $1.2 million in damages. The Taxi Driver star, 80, was accused of being an abusive boss in the bombshell trial hear by eight jurors at Manhattan Federal Court. Jurors were sent out just before noon local time on Thursday, after listening to a week-and-a-half of evidence in the $12 million case brought by 41 year-old Robinson.

➤DOCTORS MAKE FIRST EYE TRANSPLANT: A team of New York surgeons has performed the world’s first whole-eye transplant on a human, a development that could change vision treatments even though the patient hasn’t regained sight in the grafted eye.  In the six months since the eye surgery was performed, in conjunction with a partial face transplant, the 46-year-old patient has shown promising signs of health in the eye, the surgical team at NYU Langone Health said Thursday.  The Wall Street Journal reports the grafted eye is maintaining normal ocular pressure and has direct blood flow to the retina, the area at the back of the eye that receives light and sends images to the brain. It isn’t known if the patient will regain his sight, but the transplant is still significant, according to Dr. Eduardo D. Rodriguez, director of the Face Transplant Program at NYU Langone.  

✞ASTRONAUT DIES: Astronaut Frank Borman is dead at 95. He commanded Apollo 8, the first manned mission to orbit the moon and return safely to Earth. After Apollo 8, Mr. Borman joined NASA administration as deputy director of flight crew operations. Later, as chief executive of Eastern Air Lines, he piloted the carrier through a turbulent business climate that led to its takeover and eventual demise

🏈NFL BEARS 16 PANTHERS 13: The Chicago Bears relied mostly on defense and running back D'Onta Foreman scored the team's only touchdown against his former club in a 16-13 victory against the visiting Carolina Panthers on Thursday. The Panthers looked to tie the game on a late drive that included two fourth-down pickups, but Eddy Pineiro missed short on a 59-yard field-goal attempt with 1:35 left. Carolina (1-8) never got the ball back.


Chicago's Cairo Santos kicked three field goals. Bears quarterback Tyson Bagent went 20-for-33 for 162 yards, with ex-Panther DJ Moore catching five passes for a team-high 58 yards. Foreman gained 80 yards on 21 carries. Panthers quarterback Bryce Young was 21-for-38 for 185 yards. He directed a 50-yard drive on Carolina's last possession, but it resulted in no points.

⚽BIG DEAL FOR WOMEN’S SOCCER: The National Women’s Soccer League has signed a deal for broadcast rights that is expected to be worth $240 million over four years. That’s the biggest deal ever for a North American women’s sports league and it’s 40 times the value of its previous broadcast deal. CBS, ESPN, Amazon and Scripps Sports will take turns airing 118 of the league’s games.

🏀HEATS’ HERRO IS ON THE INJURED LIST: Tyler Herro of the Miami Heat sprained an ankle during the team’s winning game against the Memphis Grizzlies on Wednesday. He’s expected to be out for a couple of weeks at least.

⚾A LITTLE ENCOURAGEMENT FROM OHTANI: Shohei Ohtani is sharing his love for baseball with the kids of Japan. He announced yesterday that he’s donating 60,000 baseball gloves to elementary schools in his native country in a partnership with New Balance. The sport has certainly been good to Ohtani. He’s a finalist for the 2023 American League MVP award and is now the most sought-after free agent in baseball.





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