Wednesday, April 3, 2024

4/3 WAKE-UP CALL: Israel Claims Aid Workers' Deaths 'Unintentional'


Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the strike that killed seven Gaza aid workers was unintentional.VHe called the incident involving innocent people “tragic” and said the country will “do everything so that this doesn’t happen again.” World Central Kitchen, one of the enclave’s most important aid providers, said that it had paused operations in the Middle East and that its staff had coordinated their movements ahead of time with the military. Israel said it would investigate the strike. The casualties included the first known foreign-aid workers killed in Gaza since the war began, according to the Washington-based charity founded by celebrity chef José Andrés. A White House National Security Council spokesman said that the U.S. was outraged and that aid worker-military coordination needed to improve.

➤BIDEN EXPRESSES OUTRAGE: President Joe Biden expressed outrage Tuesday over the deaths of seven humanitarian aid workers, including one American, for the nonprofit group World Central Kitchen who were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza. "They were providing food to hungry civilians in the middle of a war," Biden said in a statement. "They were brave and selfless. Their deaths are a tragedy." Biden called chef José Andrés, who founded the organization in 2010, to express his condolences. The president said he is heartbroken over the workers' deaths and applauded the group's "relentless and heroic efforts to get food to hungry people around the globe." Israel has pledged to conduct a thorough investigation into why the aid workers’ vehicles were hit by airstrikes. "That investigation must be swift, it must bring accountability and its findings must be made public," Biden said.

➤IRAN VOWS RETALIATION:  Iran has vowed to retaliate after it accused Israel of bombing its embassy complex in Syria on Monday, in a deadly escalation of regional tensions over the war in Gaza that once again appeared to raise the risk of a wider Middle Eastern conflict. The airstrike destroyed the consulate building in the capital Damascus, killing at least seven officials including Mohammed Reza Zahedi, a top commander in Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), and senior commander Mohammad Hadi Haji Rahimi, according to Iran’s Foreign Ministry. At least six Syrian citizens were also killed, Iranian state television reported on Tuesday. Zahedi, a former commander of the IRGC’s ground forces, air force, and the deputy commander of its operations, is the most high-profile Iranian target killed since then-US President Donald Trump ordered the assassination of IRGC Gen. Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad in 2020.

➤QUAKE ROCKS TAIWAN: A 7.2 magnitude earthquake rocked Taiwan on Wednesday, the strongest tremor to hit the island in at least 25 years, killing seven people, injuring dozens and sparking a tsunami warning for southern Japan and the Philippines that was later lifted. Taiwan's government said four people had died in the mountainous, sparsely populated eastern county of Hualien near where the epicenter was, with more than 50 injured. 

At least 26 buildings have collapsed, more than half in Hualien, though in one of the worst damaged ones 22 people were rescued with only one missing, the fire department said. Taiwan television stations showed footage of buildings at precarious angles in Hualien, where the quake struck just offshore around 8am as people were going to work and school.


➤TESLA REPORTS SALES DECLINE:  Tesla reported its first year-over-year decline in quarterly deliveries since 2020. Elon Musk’s electric-vehicle maker delivered 386,810 vehicles globally in the first three months of 2024, down 8.5% from a year earlier and badly missing analysts’ expectations. Tesla reclaimed the title of the world’s top EV seller on a quarterly basis from China’s BYD, but the decline is a troubling sign for the world’s most valuable automaker and the overall EV market. Tesla attributed the sales drop partly to production setbacks. Its stock price fell 4.9%.

➤BIDEN, XI TALK: President Biden raised concerns over Beijing’s substantial support for Russia’s defense industry in a call with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Though China hasn’t sent lethal weapons for Russia’s war in Ukraine after repeated U.S. warnings, it has helped Moscow in other ways, a senior Biden administration official said. Biden and Xi’s call, their first since a November summit, comes ahead of Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s and Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s visits to China. When Biden and Xi met in California in the fall, they agreed to maintain regular communications.

➤CHANNEL FOR SMALLER BOATS OPENS IN BALTIMORE HARBOR: Recovery teams opened a second channel enabling smaller vessels to navigate the Port of Baltimore on Tuesday but most commercial shipping remains blocked by the collapsed bridge and stranded container ship that brought the structure down a week ago. A team including the U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the state of Maryland announced crews had cleared a channel with a depth of 14 feet, similar to the 11-foot channel opened on the opposite side of the wreckage on Monday.

💸TAYLOR SWIFT A BILLIONAIRE: The pop superstar, who reached billionaire status in October, landed on Forbes' World’s Billionaires list, the business magazine shared Tuesday. Among other celeb billionaires who made the cut – including Rihanna, Kim Kardashian, Oprah Winfrey and "Star Wars" creator George Lucas – Swift was ranked at No. 14 with a net worth of $1.1 billion. Lucas topped the celebrity billionaires list with a whopping net worth of $5.5 billion. However, Swift has made history with her economic achievement. The "Is It Over Now?" singer is the first person to reach billionaire status "based solely on songwriting and performing," according to Forbes.


⚾HARPER CLOBBERS 3 HRs: Playing through steady drizzle, wearing a red ski mask as insulation from a whipping wind and stinging 46-degree chill — and, oh yeah, 0-for-11 with five strikeouts to begin the season — Bryce Harper hit solo homers in his first two at-bats against Reds starter Graham Ashcraft, then banged a grand slam against tough lefty Brent Suter in the eighth inning.

⚾MLB SCORES:

  • Phillies 9 Reds 4
  • D=Backs 7 Yankees 0
  • Rays 5 Rangers 2
  • Dodgers 5 Giants 4
  • Red Sox 5 Athletics 4
  • Guardians 5 Mariners 2
  • Cardinales 5 Padres 2
  • Blue Jays 2 Astros 1
  • White Sox 3 Braves 2
  • Cubs 12 Rockies 2
  • Angels 3 Marlins 1
  • Royals 4 Orioles 1
  • Brewers 3 Twins 2
  • Tigers-Mets PP


➤WEDNESDAY'S WEATHER MAP:



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