Biden weighs more US defenses for Israel as the region prepares for Iranian retaliation
CNN
President Joe Biden is weighing more US defenses in the Middle as the US prepares for an Iranian retaliation against Israel that officials say could include an attack on American forces.
President Joe Biden is weighing more US defenses in the Middle East as the US prepares for an Iranian retaliation against Israel that officials say could include an attack on American forces. In a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Thursday, Biden said the US would “support Israel’s defense against threats,” which would include “new defensive US military deployments,” according to a readout of the call. The statement did not detail what new deployments would occur ahead of an anticipated Iranian attack in response to the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran. According to several US officials, the Pentagon has discussed with US Central Command what adjustments to make to US force posture in the region, but no final decision had been made as of Thursday afternoon. The officials said an Iranian response could occur in the coming days. The USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group, which includes the aircraft carrier, destroyers and other warships, has been operating in the Gulf of Oman in recent weeks. The strike group could potentially move into the Gulf of Aden or the Red Sea, where Navy warships have intercepted dozens of Houthi launches over the past several months. The USS Wasp amphibious assault ship and several other Navy vessels are currently operating in the Mediterranean Sea. The group includes a Marine expeditionary unit capable of carrying out an evacuation of American citizens from Lebanon if the US ordered such an evacuation. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) promised a “harsh” and “painful” response to the assassination. Israel has not commented on the killing.
Panama denied a claim made by the State Department on Wednesday that the Central American nation had agreed to no longer charge fees for US government ships to transit the country’s famous canal.
The one-time Georgia prosecutor accused of using her office to impede the investigation into Ahmaud Arbery’s killers is set to stand trial more than four years after the Black 26-year-old’s death fueled nationwide protests over racial injustice.
Eligible federal workers must decide by 11:59 pm ET on Thursday whether to take the Trump administration’s deferred resignation offer, which will allow them to leave their jobs but be paid through the end of September.
Two Treasury Department employees affiliated with Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency will keep limited access to the highly sensitive payment system within the agency, following emergency court proceedings Wednesday that arose out of privacy concerns about DOGE’s access to the system.
The CIA has sent the White House an unclassified email listing all new hires that have been with the agency for two years or less in an effort to comply with an executive order to downsize the federal workforce, according to three sources familiar with the matter – a deeply unorthodox move that could potentially expose the identities of those officers to foreign government hackers.
After nearly three weeks in the minority, Democrats have finally settled on a target to rally against: Elon Musk.
The Office of Personnel Management’s chief financial officer, who manages more than $1 trillion in funds, was pushed out this week, two sources with knowledge of the situation told CNN.
Five former leaders of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) from across Republican and Democratic administrations spoke out against the Trump administration’s attempts to dismantle the humanitarian agency.
A month into the new Congress, House and Senate Republicans are still not on the same page on how to tackle President Donald Trump’s agenda raising the possibility the two chambers could be on a collision course that imperils Trump’s domestic priorities in the first months of his second term.
Newly released data from ground-based radar came out Tuesday suggesting an Army helicopter was higher than it was supposed to be when it collided with American Airlines Flight 5342 a week ago, killing all 67 people aboard both aircraft.
Trump administration officials are hurrying to catch up to the president’s audacious and improbable plan for the United States to take ownership of Gaza and redevelop it into a “Middle Eastern Riviera,” trying to wrap their heads around an idea that some hope might be so outlandish it forces other nations to step in with their own proposals for the Palestinian enclave.
Guatemala has pledged a 40% increase in deportation flights carrying Guatemalans and migrants of other nationalities from the United States, President Bernardo Arévalo announced Wednesday during a press conference with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
A second federal judge on Wednesday blocked President Donald Trump’s executive order that seeks to end birthright citizenship, saying it’s likely unconstitutional and “runs counter to our nation’s 250-year history of citizenship by birth.”