Author: PolitCens

SAN FRANCISCO — If it feels like TikTok has been around forever, that’s probably because it has, at least if you’re measuring via internet time. What’s now in question is whether it will be around much longer and, if so, in what form?

Starting in 2017, when the Chinese social video app merged with its competitor Musical.ly, TikTok has grown from a niche teen app into a global trendsetter. While, of course, also emerging as a potential national security threat, according to U.S. officials.

On April 24, President Joe Biden signed legislation requiring TikTok parent ByteDance to sell to a U.S. owner within a year or to shut down. TikTok and its China-based parent company, ByteDance, filed a lawsuit against the U.S., claiming the security concerns were overblown and the law should be struck down because it violates the First Amendment.

The Supreme Court on Friday unanimously upheld the federal law banning TikTok, and the popular short form video service went dark in the U.S. — just hours before the ban was set to begin.

Here’s how TikTok came to this juncture:

March 2012

ByteDance is founded in China by entrepreneur Zhang Yimin. Its first hit product is Toutiao, a personalized news aggregator for Chinese users.

July 2014

Startup Musical.ly, later known for an eponymous app used to post short lipsyncing music videos, is founded in China by entrepreneur Alex Zhu.

July 2015

Musical.ly hits #1 in the Apple App Store, following a design change that made the company’s logo visible when users shared their videos.

2016

ByteDance launches Douyin, a video sharing app for Chinese users. Its popularity inspires the company to spin off a version for foreign audiences called TikTok.

November 2017

ByteDance acquires Musical.ly for $1 billion. Nine months later, ByteDance merges it with TikTok.

Powered by an algorithm that encourages binge-watching, users begin to share a wide variety of video on the app, including dance moves, kitchen food preparation and various “challenges” to perform, record and post acts that range from serious to satirical.

February 2019

Rapper Lil Nas X releases the country-trap song “Old Town Road” on TikTok, where it goes viral and pushes the song to a record 17 weeks in the #1 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The phenomenon kicks off a wave of TikTok videos from musical artists who suddenly see TikTok as a critical way to reach fans.

TikTok settles federal charges of violating U.S. child-privacy laws and agrees to pay a $5.7 million fine.

September 2019

The Washington Post reports that while images of Hong Kong democracy protests and police crackdowns are common on most social media sites, they are strangely absent on TikTok. The same story notes that TikTok posts with the #trump2020 tag received more than 70 million views.

The company insists that TikTok content moderation, conducted in the U.S., is not responsible and says the app is a place for entertainment, not politics.

The Guardian reports on internal documents that reportedly detail how TikTok instructs its moderators to delete or limit the reach of videos touching on topics sensitive to China such as the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and subsequent massacre, Tibetan independence or the sanctioned religious group Falun Gong.

October 2019

U.S. politicians begin to raise alarms about TikTok’s influence, calling for a federal investigations of its Musical.ly acquisition and a national security probe into TikTok and other Chinese-owned apps. That investigation begins in November, according to news reports.

December 2019

The Pentagon recommends that all U.S. military personnel delete TikTok from all phones, personal and government-issued. Some services ban the app on military-owned phones. In January, the Pentagon bans the app from all military phones.

TikTok becomes the second-most downloaded app in the world, according to data from analytics firm SensorTower.

May 2020

Privacy groups file a complaint alleging TikTok is still violating U.S. child-protection laws and flouting a 2019 settlement agreement. The company “takes the issue of safely seriously” and continues to improve safeguards, it says.

TikTok hires former Disney executive Kevin Mayer as its chief executive officer in an apparent attempt to improve its U.S. relations. Mayer resigns three months later.

July 2020

India bans TikTok and dozens of other Chinese apps in response to a border clash with China.

President Donald Trump says he is considering banning TikTok as retaliation for China’s alleged mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

August 2020

Trump issues a sweeping but vague executive order banning American companies from any “transaction” with ByteDance and its subsidiaries, including TikTok. Several days later, he issues a second order demanding that ByteDance divest itself of TikTok’s U.S. operations within 90 days.

Microsoft confirms it is exploring acquisition of TikTok. The deal never materializes; neither does a similar overture from Oracle and Walmart. TikTok, meanwhile, sues the Trump administration for alleged violation of due process in its executive orders.

November 2020

Joe Biden is elected president. He doesn’t offer new policy on TikTok and won’t take office until January, but Trump’s plans to force a sale of TikTok start to unravel anyway. The Trump administration extends the deadlines it had imposed on ByteDance and TikTok and eventually lets them slide altogether.

February 2021

Newly sworn-in President Joe Biden postpones the legal cases involving Trump’s plan to ban TikTok, effectively bringing them to a halt.

September 2021

TikTok announces it has more than a billion monthly active users.

December 2021

A Wall Street Journal report finds TikTok algorithms can flood teens with a torrent of harmful material such as videos recommending extreme dieting, a form of eating disorder.

February 2022

TikTok announces new rules to deter the spread of harmful material such as viral hoaxes and promotion of eating disorders.

April 2022

“The Unofficial Bridgerton Musical,” a project created by two fans of the Netflix show as a TikTok project, wins the Grammy for Best Musical Theater Album.

TikTok becomes the most downloaded app in the world, beating out Instagram, according to SensorTower data.

June 2022

BuzzFeed reports that China-based ByteDance employees have repeatedly accessed the nonpublic information of TikTok users, based on leaked recordings from more than 80 internal TikTok meetings. TikTok responds with a vague comment touting its commitment to security that doesn’t directly address the BuzzFeed report.

TikTok also announces it has migrated its user data to U.S. servers managed by the U.S. tech firm Oracle. But that doesn’t prevent fresh alarm among U.S. officials about the risk of Chinese authorities accessing U.S. user data.

December 2022

FBI Director Christopher Wray raises national security concerns about TikTok, warning that Chinese officials could manipulate the app’s recommendation algorithm for influence operations.

ByteDance also said it fired four employees who accessed data on journalists from Buzzfeed News and The Financial Times while attempting to track down leaks of confidential materials about the company.

February 2023

The White House gives federal agencies 30 days to ensure TikTok is deleted from all government-issued mobile devices. Both the FBI and the Federal Communications Commission warn that ByteDance could share TikTok user data with China’s authoritarian government.

March 2023

Legislators grill TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew at a six-hour congressional hearing where Chew, a native of Singapore, attempts to push back on assertions that TikTok and ByteDance are tools of the Chinese government.

January 2024

TikTok said it was restricting a tool some researchers use to analyze popular videos on the platform.

March 2024

A bill to ban TikTok or force its sale to a U.S. company gathers steam in Congress. TikTok brings dozens of its creators to Washington to tell lawmakers to back off, while emphasizing changes the company has made to protect user data. TikTok also annoys legislators by sending notifications to users urging them to “speak up now” or risk seeing TikTok banned; users then flood congressional offices with calls.

The House of Representatives passes the TikTok ban-or-sell bill.

April 2024

The Senate follows suit, sending the bill to President Biden, who signs it.

May 2024

TikTok and its Chinese parent company ByteDance sue the U.S. federal government to challenge a law that would force the sale of ByteDance’s stake or face a ban, saying that the law is unconstitutional.

June 2024

Former President Donald Trump joins TikTok and begins posting campaign-related content.

July 2024

Vice President Kamala Harris joins TikTok and also begins posting campaign-related material.

Dec. 6, 2024

A federal appeals court panel unanimously upheld a law that could lead to a ban on TikTok, handing a resounding defeat to the popular social media platform as it fights for its survival in the U.S. The panel of judges rebuffed the company’s challenge of the statute, which it argued had ran afoul of the First Amendment.

Dec. 27, 2024

President-elect Donald Trump asked the Supreme Court to pause the potential TikTok ban from going into effect until his administration can pursue a “political resolution” to the issue.

Jan. 17, 2025

The Supreme Court unanimously upheld the federal law banning TikTok beginning unless it’s sold by its China-based parent company, holding that the risk to national security posed by its ties to China overcomes concerns about limiting speech by the app. A ban is set to into effect on Jan. 19, 2025.

Jan. 18, 2025

TikTok users in the United States were prevented from watching videos on the popular social media platform just hours before a federal ban was set to take effect.

“A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the U.S.,” a message in the app said. “Unfortunately, that means you can’t use TikTok for now.”

The company’s app was also removed from prominent app stores, including the ones operated by Apple and Google, while its website told users that the short-form video platform was no longer available.

Jan. 19, 2025

Shortly after the app went dark for U.S. users, Trump said he would issue an executive order upon taking office to grant TikTok an extension so that it could remain online.

A few hours later, TikTok restored service to users in the United States, saying that Trump had provided “the necessary clarity and assurance to our service providers that they will face no penalties providing TikTok to over 170 million Americans.”
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WASHINGTON — Metal fences, concrete barriers and security checkpoints still line many the walkways and cross streets of the National Mall – extending from the U.S. Capitol down past some of Washington’s most noted landmarks – as the nation prepares to swear in its 47th president.

But while the 0.6-square-kilometer (146-acre) swath of land is often the highlight of many a tourist visit, it is no longer the focus of security efforts for when President-elect Donald Trump takes the oath of office for a second time.

Frigid temperatures forecast for much of Monday led Trump to move the festivities inside – the inauguration to the U.S. Capitol Rotunda and the traditional inaugural parade to the nearby Capital One Arena.

The changes, first announced Friday, presented a last-minute hitch for security and law enforcement officials, who had been planning for the inauguration for the past year.

And it has left them, and the approximately 25,000 law enforcement and military personnel charged with security, with multiple challenges.

“We will shift those assets,” said the U.S. Secret Service’s Matt McCool, briefing reporters Sunday.

“We have not cut anything from what our original plan was,” he said. “I’m very confident, with our partners here, we will be ready.”

The numbers could make the situation especially trying.

Organizers had expected about 250,000 ticketed guests to descend on the U.S. Capitol and the National Mall to watch the inauguration.

Only a select few will be allowed into the Capitol Rotunda, which accommodates just 600 people. And the Capital One Area seats just 20,000.

If even just a fraction of the 250,000 people who had planned on attending the inauguration try to get to the arena, there could be a crunch.

Washington Metropolitan Police Chief Pamela Smith said Sunday her force, bolstered by and about 4,000 police officers from across the U.S., will be ready.

“Nothing has really changed,” Smith told reporters. “The police officers that were committed and dedicated to coming here, we’ll be flexible in how we’ll adjust [their] movement. … So, we will still have police officers in places and spaces around our city as we initially planned.”

Some of those officers, Smith said, will still be assigned to the original parade route in anticipation that some people will try to get a glimpse of the presidential motorcade as it goes by.

U.S. Capitol Police said they also anticipate having officers on the periphery of the West Front of the Capitol – now closed off with the inauguration moved indoors – ready to direct ticketed guests who will no longer be able to attend.

In addition, the inaugural security contingent, which includes the U.S. Secret Service, the FBI, U.S. Capitol Police, Washington Metropolitan Police, and some 7,800 members of the U.S. Army and Air National Guard, will all be coordinated from a command center linked into an expanded network of cameras keeping watch on the city.

And though security measures in some areas, including along parts of the National Mall, have been relaxed, officials said there will be plenty of reminders for anyone coming to Washington that this is no ordinary time.

“They will see tactical teams,” McCool said, during an earlier briefing with reporters last week. “They’ll see, officers and agents on rooftops, they’ll see checkpoints. They’ll see road closures and barriers in concrete.”

Even before the inauguration was moved inside, officials had been preparing for what they described as “a higher threat environment,” cautioning the security plans for this inauguration were already more robust than in the past.

“The biggest threat, I think, for all of us remains the lone actor,” said Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger. “That threat … remains the biggest justification for us being on this heightened stage state of alert.”

Those concerns were heightened following the New Year’s Day terror attack and truck ramming in New Orleans and the Las Vegas Cybertruck explosion outside the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Earlier this month Capitol Police arrested two men suspected of trying to disrupt the state funeral for former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, one who tried to bring knives and a machete into the Capitol and another who set their car on fire.

Research, including a recent survey by the University of Chicago Project on Security and Threats, adds to the concerns.

“Over 5% of the American public supports the use of force to prevent Donald Trump from becoming president,” Robert Pape, the project’s director, told VOA.

“That equates to 14,000,000 American adults,” he said. “That’s an unfortunately disturbing number.”

Already, Trump was also the target of two attempted assassinations.

There is also an ongoing threat from Iran. Despite repeated Iranian denials, U.S. security and law enforcement officials have accused Tehran of trying to kill Trump, unveiling one plot set to be carried out last year, in the days after the U.S. presidential election.

For now, though, U.S. officials see no signs of impending trouble.

“The FBI is not currently tracking any credible or specific threats to the inaugural ceremony or the Capitol complex,” the bureau’s Washington Field Office told VOA. “We will continue to work closely with our partners to share information and identify and disrupt any threats that may emerge.”

Another source for concern is the tens of thousands of protesters, though so far, there have been no major incidents.

Saturday’s People’s March, which was permitted to have as many as 50,000 protesters, sparked only brief tensions with Trump supporters.

Another group, called We Fight Back, has permits for protests involving about 10,000 people in across several locations on Monday.

“Please note that [we] will ensure your right to peacefully protest and assemble,” said the Metropolitan Police Department’s Smith.

“However, I want to reiterate, as I always have, that violence, destruction and unlawful behavior will not be tolerated,” she said. “Offenders will face swift and decisive consequences … anyone who thinks that they can come into this city to destroy property, we will be prepared to deal with them.”

Kim Lewis contributed to this report.
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At 23, American Army veteran Manus McCaffery volunteered to join the fight against Russian aggression in Ukraine. In 2022, a Russian shell left him partially blind, but despite his wounds he continues to fight for those on the front lines. Ivanna Pidborska met with McCaffery. Anna Rice narrates her story. VOA footage by Iurii Panin.
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After President Joe Biden announced a ban on oil and gas drilling off most of the U.S. coastline in early January, President-elect Donald Trump quickly vowed to reverse it after he takes office on January 20. But there is one section of the California coast that has gained more permanent protection from drilling – a new national marine sanctuary. Genia Dulot takes us underwater for a look.
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WHITE HOUSE — A ceasefire in Gaza began Sunday after Israel’s Cabinet approved a deal, with 24 ministers voting in favor and eight ministers rejecting the agreement. The deal was scheduled to be implemented beginning Sunday. But on Saturday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it would not start unless Hamas provided a list of the three hostages set for release Sunday.

Hamas ultimately provided the names and Israel said the ceasefire would begin at 11:15 a.m.

The deal to end the fighting between Israel and Hamas was achieved after more than a year of negotiations, with mediation from the United States, Qatar and Egypt. U.S. President Joe Biden first endorsed the deal in May. The warring parties agreed to it on Wednesday, and it was subsequently approved by the Israeli Cabinet early Saturday in Israel.

Starting midday on Monday when President-elect Donald Trump is inaugurated, it will be up to his administration to see that the deal is enforced.

The agreement has three phases, each of which will last six weeks. The terms of phases two and three are still being negotiated, but under phase one the cessation of hostilities is expected to continue if six weeks pass before the next phase is finalized.

Phase one includes withdrawal of Israeli forces from densely populated areas and more aid for Gaza, as well as the release of some Palestinians detained in Israeli prisons and some hostages held by Hamas, including Americans. The U.S. and other Western countries have designated Hamas as a terrorist group.

The release of American hostages is a “fundamental component” of Trump’s interest in ending the war swiftly, according to Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, resident senior fellow with the Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative at the Atlantic Council’s Middle East Programs.

Whether Trump will sustain pressure for the deal to proceed to phase two, when all of the hostages are set to be released, and to phase three, when reconstruction of Gaza will begin, remains to be seen, Alkhatib told VOA.

Alkhatib expressed concern that after the first phase Trump will be “so disinterested” in Gaza that the agreement will amount to “little more than a freezing of the conflict.” This would be disastrous for Palestinians in Gaza and the goal of Palestinian statehood, he added.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said late Friday that he had received “unequivocal guarantees” from Biden and Trump that if negotiations on phase two fail, Israel “will return to intense fighting with the backing of the United States.”

Hamas militants killed about 1,200 people and captured about 250 hostages in their Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel that sparked the current war. Israel says Hamas is still holding 101 hostages, including 35 the military says are dead.

Israel’s counteroffensive in Gaza has killed more than 46,000 Palestinians, according to the territory’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between combatants and civilians in its count.

Two-state solution

The Biden administration’s goal has been Palestinian statehood under the two-state solution. This could pave the way to bringing Saudi Arabia into the Abraham Accords — the 2020 deal brokered under the first Trump administration that normalized diplomatic relations between Israel and its Arab neighbors, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.

Biden had sought to expand the accords to include Saudi Arabia, which maintains it will not consider normalizing relations until Israel commits to a “credible path” to a Palestinian state. Washington and Riyadh had been exploring the expansion through a package that would include, among other offers, American security guarantees for the Saudis. Those efforts stalled after the Oct. 7 Hamas onslaught.

Now Trump appears to be aiming to use the momentum of the Gaza ceasefire to add Saudi Arabia into the accords.

“We will continue promoting PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH throughout the region, as we build upon the momentum of this ceasefire to further expand the Historic Abraham Accords,” Trump posted on social media Wednesday following the announcement that a ceasefire deal has been reached.

Saudi Arabia has never formally recognized Israel since its creation in 1948. As a de facto leader of the Arab and Islamic world, Riyadh’s recognition would represent a breakthrough for the Jewish state.

Trump’s main objective now is to ensure that whatever happens in Gaza does not prevent him from securing that deal, while Israel’s goal is to ensure whatever happens in Gaza doesn’t prevent cooperation with the U.S. over Iran, said Jonathan Rynhold, head of the department of political studies at Bar Ilan University.

“So, I’m not sure that it makes sense to think beyond the first phase at this point,” Rynhold told VOA.

Trump and Israel will “work out their positions on Gaza precisely against the shadow of those two things,” he added.

Trump’s role in securing the deal

In the same social media post Wednesday, Trump took credit for his role in securing the ceasefire.

“This EPIC ceasefire agreement could have only happened as a result of our Historic Victory in November, as it signaled to the entire World that my Administration would seek Peace and negotiate deals to ensure the safety of all Americans, and our Allies,” Trump wrote.

For months the Biden administration has progressively included Trump’s team in peace talks, beginning with an Oval Office meeting a week after Trump won the election. At that Nov. 13 meeting, Biden proposed that they work together to push the deal through.

“We’ve sent a signal to the incoming team that we’re prepared to work with them on this issue,” national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters that day.

Shortly after, Sullivan and Biden’s top Middle East adviser, Brett McGurk, began coordinating with their successors on the Trump team, Mike Waltz and Steve Witkoff, said a senior administration official who spoke with reporters on background Wednesday.

The Biden official said that in the final days leading up to the ceasefire, Witkoff worked in tandem with McGurk in an “almost unprecedented,” cross-administration partnership that was “highly constructive, very fruitful.” But he declined to elaborate on Witkoff’s and Trump’s role in securing the deal, other than saying that the presidential transition provided a “natural” deadline for a diplomatic breakthrough.

Pressure on Israel

Critics have accused Biden of failing to use U.S. military support as leverage over Netanyahu to reach a deal or moderate Israel’s campaign, which has taken tens of thousands of Palestinian lives.

Publicly, Biden officials have largely echoed Israel in faulting Hamas for the failure of the talks. But some Israeli security officials and many observers also blame Netanyahu for blocking progress, including by repeatedly introducing fresh demands in negotiations.

With Trump’s victory, Netanyahu’s calculations may have changed, said Laura Blumenfeld, senior fellow at the Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies.

“Trump injected a kind of fear factor into this process that was missing before,” she told VOA. “He can’t triangulate anymore the way he would play Biden off of the Republican Congress. There’s nowhere for Netanyahu to run, nowhere to hide, and so he took this deal he couldn’t refuse.”

Trump’s pressure may have also created space for Netanyahu to resist ultimatums from far-right allies who had threatened to leave his governing coalition if a ceasefire deal is made, which would mean an end to the prime minister’s term.

Eight Israeli far-right politicians, including National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, rejected the deal, but it is still unclear whether they will leave the coalition.

“Netanyahu finally called their bluff,” Blumenfeld said. “Or maybe actually, Trump called Netanyahu’s bluff, because he was using these right-wing Cabinet members all along as an excuse not to make the concessions that he didn’t want to make.”

VOA’s Natasha Mozgovaya contributed to this report. Some information for this report came from The Associated Press.
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Boston — Tens of millions of residents along the East Coast are bracing for several centimeters of snow Sunday followed by dangerously cold temperatures that will take hold in much of the country from the Northern Plains to the tip of Maine.

Winter storm warnings issued by the National Weather Service have already gone into effect for parts of the Mid-Atlantic through Monday morning, with the forecast projecting up to 15 centimeters of snow. Warnings will begin in New England on Sunday afternoon, with parts of Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine and Connecticut seeing as much as 25 centimeters of snow.

Marc Chenard, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in College Park, Maryland, projected that as many as 70 million residents will be under some kind of winter storm hazards warning in the coming days including in New England and the Mid-Atlantic. Large cities like Philadelphia, New York and Boston could see several centimeters of snow this evening with the highest totals being outside of major cities.

“There will certainly be some more hazardous road conditions anywhere from D.C. up the whole I-95 corridor and then inland from there later today and tonight,” Chenard said. “Then it gets quite cold behind that. By Monday morning, any roads that haven’t been treated or cleared will still likely be some hazardous travel conditions.”

Return of the Arctic blast

But the snow is just the start of a chaotic week of weather.

Much of the eastern half of the United States will be enduring some of the coldest temperatures this winter, if not for several years.

An area from the Rockies into the Northern Plains will see colder than normal temperatures starting Sunday into the coming week, with temperatures dropping to minus 34 degrees C to minus 48 C on Sunday and Monday. Wind chills of minus 40 C were already being clocked in parts of North Dakota and Minnesota. Sub-zero wind chills are forecast to reach as far south as Oklahoma and the Tennessee Valley.

The cold weather forecast for Monday for Washington, D.C., prompted President-elect Donald Trump’s inaugural ceremony to be moved inside the U.S. Capitol Rotunda.

“It’s going to be a cold day in Washington, D.C. on Monday. That’s for sure,” Chenard said, noting temperatures will be in the 20s with wind gust upwards of 48 kph.

As happened earlier this month, this latest cold snap comes from a disruption in the polar vortex, the ring of cold air usually trapped about the North Pole.

The cold air will moderate as it moves southward and eastward, but the central and eastern U.S. will still be cold with highs in the teens and 20s on Monday into Tuesday, Chenard said. The Mid-Atlantic and Northeast also will have highs in the teens and 20s, lows in the single digits and below minus 18 C and wind chills below zero.

Unusual wintry mix

The colder temperatures will reach down into the South early this week, where as many as 30 million people starting Monday could see a wintry mix of snow, sleet and freezing rain. The unusual conditions are expected to stretch from Texas into northern Florida and the Carolinas. Impacts are expected to start in Texas on Monday night and spread across the Gulf Coast and Southeast on Tuesday into Wednesday.

A combination of frigid air with a low pressure system over the Gulf is behind the storm, which could bring heavy snow just south of the Interstate 20 corridor across northern Louisiana and into Mississippi and a mix of snow, sleet, and freezing rain near the Interstate 10 corridor from Houston to Mobile, Alabama.

Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry on Saturday issued a state of emergency in advance of the wintry weather. He encouraged Louisianans to be prepared and to monitor the weather forecast.
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WASHINGTON — The U.S. Treasury Department on Friday imposed sanctions on alleged hacker Yin Kecheng and cybersecurity company Sichuan Juxinhe Network Technology Co., accusing both of being involved in a series of hacks against American telecom companies.

The intrusions, known under the name Salt Typhoon, have allegedly exposed a huge swath of Americans’ call logs to Chinese spies and rattled the U.S. intelligence community. In some cases, hackers are alleged to have intercepted conversations, including between prominent U.S. politicians and government officials. Some lawmakers have described them as the worst telecom hacks in U.S. history.

In a statement, the Treasury described Sichuan Juxinhe Network Technology Co. as a hacking company with strong ties to China’s Ministry of State Security, an intelligence agency. It said that Yin Kecheng was based in Shanghai, had worked as a hacker for more than a decade, and also had ties to the MSS. It further alleged he was tied to the recent breach at the U.S. Treasury.

Reuters was not immediately able to reach Yin Kecheng or Sichuan Juxinhe. China’s embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Beijing routinely denies responsibility for cyberespionage campaigns. 
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It is one of the 20th century’s most memorable images: a naked girl, screaming, running from a napalm bombing during the Vietnam War. More than a half-century later, a new documentary is calling into question who took it — and the retired Associated Press photographer long credited for the photo insists it was his, while his longtime employer says it has no evidence of anyone else being behind the camera. 

The film about the Pulitzer Prize-winning picture, “The Stringer,” is scheduled to debut next week at the Sundance Film Festival. Both photographer Nick Ut and his longtime employer are contesting it vigorously, and Ut’s lawyer is seeking to block the premiere, threatening a defamation lawsuit. The AP, which conducted its own investigation over six months, concluded it has “no reason to believe anyone other than Ut took the photo.” 

The picture of Kim Phuc running down a road in the village of Trang Bang, crying and naked because she had taken off clothes burning from napalm, instantly became symbolic of the horrors of the Vietnam War. 

Taken on June 8, 1972, the photo is credited to Ut, then a 21-year-old staffer in AP’s Saigon bureau. He was awarded the Pulitzer a year later. Now 73, he moved to California after the war and worked for the AP for 40 years until retiring in 2017. 

The film’s allegations open an unexpected new chapter for an image that, within hours of it being taken, was beamed around the planet and became one of the most indelible photographs of both the Vietnam War and the turbulent century that produced it. Whatever the truth, the film’s investigations apparently relate only to the identity of the photographer and not the image’s overall authenticity. 

The dispute puts the filmmakers, who call the episode “a scandal behind the making of one of the most-recognized photographs of the 20th century,” at odds with Ut, whose work that day defined his career. It also puts them at cross purposes with the AP, a global news organization for whom accuracy is a foundational part of the business model. 

How did the questioning of the photo begin? 

It’s difficult, so many years later, to overestimate the wallop that this particular image packed. Ron Burnett, an expert on images and former president of the Emily Carr University of Art and Design, called it “earth-shattering.” 

“It changed the way photos have always been thought about and broke the rules for how much violence you can show to the public,” Burnett said. 

The photo sat unchallenged for much of its 53-year existence. All these years later, a counter-narrative has emerged that it was instead taken by another person, someone who worked for NBC News at the time and also lives now in California. The person allegedly had delivered his film to the AP’s office as a “stringer,” a non-staff member who provides material to a news organization. 

The husband-and-wife team of Gary Knight, founder of the VII Foundation, and producer Fiona Turner are behind the film. On his website, Knight described “The Stringer” as “a story that many in our profession did not want told, and some of them continue to go to great lengths to make sure isn’t told.” 

“The film grapples with questions of authorship, racial injustice and journalistic ethics while shining a light on the fundamental yet often unrecognized contributions of local freelancers who provide the information we need to understand how events worldwide impact us all,” Knight wrote. 

Knight did not return a message seeking comment from the AP on Thursday. A representative from Sundance also did not return a message about a cease-and-desist letter from Ut’s lawyer, James Hornstein, trying to stop the film’s airing. Hornstein would not make Ut available for an interview, saying he anticipated future litigation. 

Knight and Turner met with AP in London last June about the allegations. According to the AP, filmmakers requested the news organization sign a non-disclosure agreement before they provided their evidence. AP declined. 

That hampered the AP’s own investigation, along with the passage of time. Horst Faas, chief of photos for AP in Saigon in 1972, and Yuichi “Jackson” Ishizaki, who developed Ut’s film, are both dead. Many of the Saigon bureau’s records were lost when communists took over the city, including any dealings with “the stringer.” Negatives of photos used back then are preserved in AP’s corporate archives in New York, but they provided no insight for the investigation. 

Still, the AP decided to release its own findings before seeing “The Stringer” and the details of the claim that it is making. “AP stands prepared to review any evidence and take whatever remedial action might be needed if their thesis is proved true,” the news organization said. 

Some who were there are sure about what happened 

The AP said it spoke to seven surviving people who were in Trang Bang or AP’s Saigon bureau that day, and all maintain they have no reason to doubt their own conclusions that Ut had taken the photo. 

One was Fox Butterfield, a renowned longtime New York Times reporter, who also said that he was contacted by Turner for the documentary. “I told them what my memory was and they didn’t like it, but they just went ahead anyway,” Butterfield told AP. 

Another was photographer David Burnett, who said he witnessed Ut and Alexander Shimkin, a freelance photographer working primarily for Newsweek, taking photos as Kim Phuc and other children emerged from smoke following an attack. Shimkin was killed in Vietnam a month later, according to the investigation. 

A key source for the story in “The Stringer” is Carl Robinson, then a photo editor for the AP in Saigon, who was initially overruled in his judgment not to use the picture. AP reached out to Robinson as part of its probe, but he said he had signed an NDA with Knight and the VII Foundation. Knight followed up, saying Robinson would only speak off the record, which the AP concluded would have prevented the news organization from setting the record straight. 

Robinson did not immediately reply to an email seeking comment on Thursday. 

On duty that day in Saigon, Robinson had concluded that Ut’s picture could not be used because it would have violated standards prohibiting nudity. But Faas overruled him, and senior AP editors in New York decided to run the picture for what it conveyed about war. 

The AP questioned Robinson’s long silence in contradicting Ut’s photo credit, and showed a photo from its archives of Robinson with champagne toasting Ut’s Pulitzer Prize. In a 2005 interview with corporate archives, Robinson said he thought AP “created a monster” when it distributed the photo because much of the world’s sympathies were focused on one victim, instead of war victims more broadly. 

Former AP correspondent Peter Arnett, who believes Ut made the image, said Robinson wrote to him after Faas’ death in 2012 to make the allegation that Ut had not taken it; he said he did not want to do it while Faas was still alive. According to the AP investigation, Arnett said Robinson told him that Ut had “gone all Hollywood” and he didn’t like it. 

Hornstein characterized Robinson, who was dismissed by AP in 1978, as “a guy with a 50-year vendetta against the AP.” He also questioned the long silence by the man supposedly identified in the documentary as the person who really took the photo. 

The lawyer also produced a statement from Kim Phuc, who said that while she has no memory of that day, her uncle has repeatedly told her that Ut took the picture and that she had no reason to doubt him. Ut also took her to the nearest hospital after the photo was taken, she wrote. 
…

When Donald Trump returns to the White House on Monday, his family circle will look a little different than it did when he first arrived eight years ago.

His youngest son, Barron, was in fifth grade back then. He’s now a college freshman who towers over his 1.8-meter-plus dad. Granddaughter Kai, who was 9 in 2017, is now an aspiring social media influencer and impressive golfer. Grandson Joseph, who posed in Trump’s lap with a Lego model of the White House last time, is 11 now.

After working in his first administration, the most prominent relatives in Trump’s political sphere, daughter Ivanka and her husband, Jared, are now in Florida.

Family members can provide presidents with a ready source of moral and sounding-board support, companionship and even relief from the world’s problems.

The president-elect has five children — three of whom are married — from his marriages to Ivana Trump, Marla Maples and current wife Melania Trump. He has 10 grandchildren, with an 11th on the way.

A look at Trump’s family circle, then and now:

Melania Trump, Trump’s wife

THEN: She spent the opening months of Trump’s term at the family’s Manhattan penthouse so that 11-year-old Barron wouldn’t have to switch schools in the middle of the year. After moving to the White House, she traveled around the United States and to other countries, alone and with Trump, partly to promote her “Be Best” children’s initiative while fiercely guarding her privacy.

NOW: She avoided active campaigning during Trump’s 2024 run, limiting her public appearances to key moments, such as the campaign’s launch, the Republican National Convention and election night. She released a self-titled memoir late last year and will be the subject of a documentary distributed by Amazon Prime Video that is expected to be released this year. While some doubt that Trump’s 54-year-old wife will spend much time at the White House, she said on Fox News’ Fox & Friends that she has already packed and picked out the furniture she wants to take to the executive mansion.

Donald Trump Jr., Trump’s eldest son

THEN: Trump’s eldest son, now 46, campaigned for his father in 2016 and 2020.

NOW: Trump Jr.’s influence has grown to the point that he lobbied his father to choose close friend JD Vance for vice president. He also pushed for former Democratic Representative Tulsi Gabbard and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the president-elect’s picks for director of national intelligence and health and human services, respectively. Trump Jr. helps run the family real estate business and is an honorary chairman of Trump’s transition. He has a podcast and has said his role is to prevent “bad actors” from getting into the administration. He recently flew on his father’s airplane to Greenland; the president-elect has expressed a desire to take control of the mineral-rich Danish territory.

Trump Jr. has five children — or “smurfs,” as he sometimes refers to them — with his former wife, Vanessa Trump. They are Kai Madison, 17; Donald John III, 15; Tristan Milos, 13; Spencer Frederick, 12; and Chloe Sophia Trump, 10.

Ivanka Trump, Trump’s eldest daughter

THEN: Ivanka, 43, campaigned for her father in 2016 and moved her family from New York City to Washington to work in his White House as a senior adviser. She was on the campaign trail in 2020, too, but she and her family moved to Florida and retreated from the spotlight after his loss.

NOW: As Trump geared up for the 2024 run, Ivanka announced that she loved and supported him but was getting out of politics to focus on her husband and their three kids. She did, however, join her father and other family members on election night and when he rang the bell at the New York Stock Exchange in early December after Time magazine named him Person of the Year.

Ivanka and her husband have three children: Arabella Rose, 13; Joseph Frederick, 11; and Theodore James Kushner, 8.

Eric Trump, Trump’s second son

THEN: The 40-year-old helped run the family business and participated in his father’s campaigns.

NOW: Eric is also an honorary chair of the transition and a close adviser to his father. But he continues to focus more on running the family business. In September, he and his brother started a crypto platform called World Liberty Financial, and their father helped launch it in an interview on the X social media platform.

Eric and his wife, Lara, have two children: Eric Luke, 7, and Carolina Dorothy Trump, 5.

Tiffany Trump, Trump’s youngest daughter

THEN: Trump’s daughter with second wife Marla Maples was 23 and a recent University of Pennsylvania graduate who kept a low profile when Trump was first elected.

NOW: She was more present in the 2024 campaign but still largely avoids the spotlight. Tiffany, 31, and her husband, Michael Boulos, are expecting their first child this year. Boulos is a businessman who traveled with Trump in the final stretch of the campaign. His father is Massad Boulos, a Lebanese American businessman who helped Trump with the influential Arab American community in the swing state of Michigan. Trump has named Massad Boulos to be a senior adviser on Arab and Middle Eastern affairs.

Barron Trump, Trump’s youngest son

THEN: At the start of Trump’s first term, Barron and his mother stayed at the family’s Trump Tower penthouse in Manhattan so he could finish his school year. When they got to Washington, his soccer net appeared in what’s known as the first lady’s garden.

NOW: Barron, 18, is a freshman New York University business student. His parents and Trump campaign officials credit him for recommending podcasts popular with young men that the president-elect appeared on during the campaign. Barron will have a bedroom in the White House, Melania Trump said on Fox & Friends.

“I’m very proud of him, about his knowledge, even about politics and giving an advice to his father,” his mother said on the program. “He brought in so many young people. He knows his generation.”

Lara Trump, Trump’s daughter-in-law

THEN: Trump’s daughter-in-law, 42, campaigned for him during all his runs. After Trump lost to Democrat Joe Biden in 2020, she considered running for a U.S. Senate seat from her home state of North Carolina but ultimately decided against it. She became a Fox News commentator.

NOW: As Trump revved up his 2024 campaign, he installed his daughter-in-law as co-chair of the Republican National Committee, where she was a TV-ready advocate overseeing fundraising, voter outreach and the party’s “election integrity” initiative. She stepped down from the RNC after the election and removed her name from consideration as a possible successor to Florida Senator Marco Rubio, Trump’s choice for secretary of state.

Lara Trump is passionate about fitness and has her own line of activewear.

Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law

THEN: Kushner, 44, was also a key figure in Trump’s 2016 campaign. He joined his wife in the White House as a senior adviser, a role that included working on U.S. policy toward Israel and the broader Middle East.

NOW: Kushner has stepped out of the political spotlight — but his father could soon step in. Trump announced after the election that he intends to nominate Charles Kushner, a real estate developer, to be U.S. ambassador to France. The elder Kushner was pardoned by Trump in December 2020 after he pleaded guilty years earlier to tax evasion and making illegal campaign contributions.

Kai Trump, one of Trump’s granddaughters

THEN: Kai was in elementary school when her grandfather became president.

NOW: Donald Trump Jr.’s 17-year-old granddaughter is an aspiring social media influencer. Her behind-the-scenes video from election night garnered 3.7 million views on YouTube. Other posts related to her grandfather have been watched millions more times on TikTok. Kai delivered her first public speech at the Republican convention and is an avid golfer who sometimes plays with her grandfather.

Arabella Kushner, one of Trump’s granddaughters

THEN: Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner’s daughter was 6 when her grandfather showed China’s Xi Jinping a video of her, in a traditional Chinese dress, belting out Chinese-language songs.

“It’s very good, right? She’s very smart,” Trump said. Xi responded that Arabella was her grandfather’s “little angel” and a “messenger of China-U.S. relations.”

NOW: Arabella is 13 and enjoys singing, playing the piano, horseback riding and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, according to a social media post from her mother.
…

Bad Bunny released his latest album, which mixes urban and Afro-Caribbean rhythms. Between sad and joyful stories, the artist opens a space for social criticism that focuses on Puerto Rico’s identity, traditions and current challenges.

Click here for the full story in Spanish.
…

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump said Saturday that he “most likely” would give TikTok 90 more days to work out a deal that would allow the popular video-sharing platform to avoid a U.S. ban.

Trump said in an NBC News interview that he had not decided what to do but was considering granting TikTok a reprieve after he is sworn into office Monday. A law that prohibits mobile app stores and internet hosting services from distributing TikTok to U.S. users takes effect Sunday.

Under the law passed by Congress and signed by President Joe Biden last year, TikTok’s China-based parent company had nine months to sell the platform’s U.S. operation to an approved buyer. The law allows the sitting president to grant an extension if a sale is in progress.

“I think that would be, certainly, an option that we look at. “The 90-day extension is something that will be most likely done, because it’s appropriate. You know, it’s appropriate,” Trump told “Meet the Press” moderator Kristen Welker in a phone interview. “We have to look at it carefully. It’s a very big situation.

“If I decide to do that, I’ll probably announce it on Monday,” he said.
…

WASHINGTON — It is unclear who will take over at the Pentagon and the military services when the top leaders all step down Monday as U.S. President-elect Donald Trump is sworn into office.

As of Friday, officials said they had not yet heard who will become the acting defense secretary. Officials said the military chiefs of the Army, Navy and Air Force were getting ready to step in as acting service secretaries — a rare move — because no civilians had been named or, in some cases, had turned down the opportunity.

As is customary, all current political appointees will step down as of noon on Inauguration Day, leaving hundreds of key defense posts open, including dozens that require Senate confirmation. In addition to the top job and all three service secretaries, all of their deputies and senior policy staff will leave.

The Senate Armed Services Committee is expected to vote Monday on Trump’s choice to head the Defense Department, Pete Hegseth, but the full Senate vote may not happen until days later. As a result, someone from the Biden administration would have to take over temporarily.

For the service secretaries, officials said that while things could still change before the inauguration, the Trump team is eyeing General Randy George, chief of staff of the Army, to be that service’s temporary head. They said General David Allvin, chief of staff of the Air Force, and Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the Navy chief, are aware they may have to step in if no civilian is named as acting secretary, and they are preparing for that possibility.

The officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were discussing internal deliberations, said many senior Biden administration leaders are reluctant to serve in the incoming Trump administration because they are concerned about policy changes they may be required to handle or enforce.

Usually, only people appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate serve as a defense or service secretary, including in an acting capacity during a transition. Trump could pull a confirmed member of the Biden administration from another agency and put that person at the Pentagon.

Civilian control of the military is a key tenet, but under the law the military chiefs of the services — who are all Senate confirmed — can take over on a temporary basis. It’s rare, but it did happen more than 30 years ago.

Arnold Punaro, a retired Marine Corps Reserve two-star general, said that in 1993, Admiral Frank Kelso, who was Navy chief, was asked to serve as acting Navy secretary when Bill Clinton became president because civilian leaders did not step up.

“It doesn’t happen very often,” said Punaro, who spent 14 years as a staff director on the Senate Armed Services Committee and has advised nominees through the confirmation process for decades. “Normally you don’t want the active-duty military serving in the civilian control positions. The practical reality is they are wearing both hats.”

The transition to a new secretary of defense has usually been an orderly process.

Four years ago, the deputy secretary of defense under Trump, David Norquist, became acting secretary for the two-day gap between the inauguration of Democratic President Joe Biden and the Senate vote to confirm Lloyd Austin as Pentagon chief.

President Barack Obama asked his Republican predecessor’s defense secretary, Robert Gates, to stay on as his own Pentagon leader in 2009.

In 2017, Jim Mattis, Trump’s pick to be secretary during his first term, was confirmed on Inauguration Day.

Various administrations have handled the handover differently. In many cases, people have been asked to stay on in a temporary role. In one recent instance, officials said, the comptrollers of the services stepped in as acting secretaries because a key job in the coming months is to put together the massive, complex budget and more often the money people are considered less political.

This year’s gap is further complicated by the fact that Trump and Hegseth have both pledged to rid the Defense Department of what they call “woke” generals — or those who have supported diversity programs. That raises the possibility that even as the administration struggles to fill its political appointee slots, it may also be carving holes in the military leadership structure that will have to be filled.

When Senator Elissa Slotkin, a Democrat from Michigan, asked Hegseth during his nomination hearing if he intended to fire the current Joint Chiefs chairman, General CQ Brown, he answered, “Senator, every single senior officer will be reviewed based on meritocracy, standards, lethality and commitment to lawful orders they will be given.”

Hegseth previously said that Brown should be fired. Conservative groups have compiled lists of generals they believe should be fired for supporting diversity programs. If Brown is fired, the vice chairman would take over until a new chairman is confirmed.
…

WHITE HOUSE — Israel’s Cabinet approved a deal for a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release, with 24 ministers voting in favor and eight ministers rejecting the agreement. The deal is scheduled to be implemented beginning Sunday.

The deal to end the fighting between Israel and Hamas was achieved after more than a year of negotiations, with mediation from the United States, Qatar and Egypt. President Joe Biden first endorsed the deal in May. The warring parties agreed to it on Wednesday, and it was subsequently approved by the Israeli Cabinet early Saturday in Israel.

Starting midday on Monday when President-elect Donald Trump is inaugurated, it will be up to his administration to see that the deal is enforced.

The agreement has three phases, each of which will last six weeks. The terms of phases two and three are still being negotiated, but under phase one the cessation of hostilities is expected to continue if six weeks pass before the next phase is finalized.

Phase one includes withdrawal of Israeli forces from densely populated areas and more aid for Gaza, as well as the release of some Palestinians detained in Israeli prisons and some hostages held by Hamas, including Americans. The U.S. and other Western countries have designated Hamas as a terrorist group.

The release of American hostages is a “fundamental component” of Trump’s interest in ending the war swiftly, according to Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, nonresident senior fellow with the Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative at the Atlantic Council’s Middle East Programs.

Whether Trump will sustain pressure for the deal to proceed to phase two, when all of the hostages are set to be released, and to phase three, when reconstruction of Gaza will begin, remains to be seen, Alkhatib told VOA.

Alkhatib expressed concern that after the first phase Trump will be “so disinterested” in Gaza that the agreement will amount to “little more than a freezing of the conflict.” This would be disastrous for Palestinians in Gaza and the goal of Palestinian statehood, he added.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said late Friday that he had received “unequivocal guarantees” from both Biden and Trump that if negotiations on phase two fail, Israel “will return to intense fighting with the backing of the United States.” 

Hamas militants killed about 1,200 people and captured about 250 hostages in their Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel that sparked the current war. Israel says Hamas is still holding 101 hostages, including 35 the military says are dead.

Israel’s counteroffensive in Gaza has killed more than 46,000 Palestinians, according to the territory’s health ministry, which does not distinguish between combatants and civilians in its count.

Two-state solution

The Biden administration’s goal has been Palestinian statehood under the two-state solution. This could pave the way to bringing Saudi Arabia into the Abraham Accords — the 2020 deal brokered under the first Trump administration that normalized diplomatic relations between Israel and its Arab neighbors, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.

Biden had sought to expand the accords to include Saudi Arabia, which maintains it will not consider normalizing relations until Israel commits to a “credible path” to a Palestinian state. Washington and Riyadh had been exploring the expansion through a package that would include, among other offers, American security guarantees for the Saudis. Those efforts stalled after the Oct. 7 Hamas onslaught.

Now Trump appears to be aiming to use the momentum of the Gaza ceasefire to add Saudi Arabia into the accords.

“We will continue promoting PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH throughout the region, as we build upon the momentum of this ceasefire to further expand the Historic Abraham Accords,” Trump posted on social media Wednesday following the announcement that a ceasefire deal has been reached.

Saudi Arabia has never formally recognized Israel since its creation in 1948. As a de facto leader of the Arab and Islamic world, Riyadh’s recognition would represent a breakthrough for the Jewish state.

Trump’s main objective now is to ensure that whatever happens in Gaza does not prevent him from securing that deal, while Israel’s goal is to ensure whatever happens in Gaza doesn’t prevent cooperation with the U.S. over Iran, said Jonathan Rynhold, head of the department of political studies at Bar Ilan University.

“So, I’m not sure that it makes sense to think beyond the first phase at this point,” Rynhold told VOA.

Trump and Israel will “work out their positions on Gaza precisely against the shadow of those two things,” he added.

Trump’s role in securing the deal

In the same social media post Wednesday, Trump took credit for his role in securing the ceasefire.

“This EPIC ceasefire agreement could have only happened as a result of our Historic Victory in November, as it signaled to the entire World that my Administration would seek Peace and negotiate deals to ensure the safety of all Americans, and our Allies,” Trump wrote.

For months the Biden administration has progressively included Trump’s team in peace talks, beginning with an Oval Office meeting a week after Trump won the election. At that Nov. 13 meeting, Biden proposed that they work together to push the deal through.

“We’ve sent a signal to the incoming team that we’re prepared to work with them on this issue,” national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters that day.

Shortly after, Sullivan and Biden’s top Middle East adviser, Brett McGurk, began coordinating with their successors on the Trump team, Mike Waltz and Steve Witkoff, said a senior administration official who spoke with reporters on background Wednesday.

The Biden official said that in the final days leading up to the ceasefire, Witkoff worked in tandem with McGurk in an “almost unprecedented,” cross-administration partnership that was “highly constructive, very fruitful.” But he declined to elaborate on Witkoff’s and Trump’s role in securing the deal, other than saying that the presidential transition provided a “natural” deadline for a diplomatic breakthrough.

Pressure on Israel

Critics have accused Biden of failing to use U.S. military support as leverage over Netanyahu to reach a deal or moderate Israel’s campaign that has taken tens of thousands of Palestinian lives.

Publicly, Biden officials have largely echoed Israel in faulting Hamas for the failure of the talks. But some Israeli security officials and many observers also blame Netanyahu for blocking progress, including by repeatedly introducing fresh demands in negotiations.

With Trump’s victory, Netanyahu’s calculations may have changed, said Laura Blumenfeld, senior fellow at the Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies.

“Trump injected a kind of fear factor into this process that was missing before,” she told VOA. “He can’t triangulate anymore the way he would play Biden off of the Republican Congress. There’s nowhere for Netanyahu to run, nowhere to hide, and so he took this deal he couldn’t refuse.”

Trump’s pressure may have also created space for Netanyahu to resist ultimatums from far-right allies who had threatened to leave his governing coalition if a ceasefire deal is made, which would mean an end to the prime minister’s term.

Eight Israeli far-right politicians, including National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, rejected the deal but it is still unclear whether they will leave the coalition.

“Netanyahu finally called their bluff,” Blumenfeld said. “Or maybe actually, Trump called Netanyahu’s bluff, because he was using these right-wing Cabinet members all along as an excuse not to make the concessions that he didn’t want to make.” 
…

The Israeli Cabinet approved the Gaza ceasefire for hostage release early Saturday, paving the way for the deal to be implemented beginning Sunday, a day before President-elect Donald Trump takes office. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara looks at how his incoming administration might enforce the multiphase deal, and the president-elect’s role in securing it.
…

LOS ANGELES — Days after losing her home in the same fire that destroyed her Los Angeles elementary school, third-grader Gabriela Chevez-Munoz resumed classes this week at another campus temporarily hosting children from her school. She arrived wearing a T-shirt that read “Pali” — the nickname for her Pacific Palisades neighborhood — as signs and balloons of dolphins, her school’s mascot, welcomed hundreds of displaced students.

“It feels kind of like the first day of school,” Gabriela said. She said she had been scared by the fires but that she was excited to reunite with her best friend and give her hamburger-themed friendship bracelets.

Gabriela is among thousands of students whose schooling was turned upside down by wildfires that ravaged the city, destroying several schools and leaving many others in off-limits evacuation zones.

Educators across the city are scrambling to find new locations for their students, develop ways to keep up learning, and return a sense of normalcy as the city grieves at least 27 deaths and thousands of destroyed homes from blazes that scorched 63 square miles (163 square kilometers) of land.

Gabriela and 400 other students from her school, Palisades Charter Elementary School, started classes temporarily Wednesday at Brentwood Science Magnet, about 5 miles (8 kilometers) away. Her school and another decimated Palisades elementary campus may take more than two years to rebuild, Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said.

‘There’s a lot of grief’

Students from seven other LAUSD campuses in evacuation zones are also temporarily relocating to other schools.

As Layla Glassman dropped her daughter off at Brentwood, she said her priority after her family’s home burned down was making sure her three children feel safe and secure.

“We have a roof over our heads. We have them back in school. So, you know, I am happy,” she said, her voice cracking. “But of course, there’s a lot of grief.”

Many schools have held off on resuming instruction, saying their focus for now has been healing and trying to restore a sense of community. Some are organizing get-togethers and field trips to keep kids engaged in activities and with each other as they look for new space.

The Pasadena Unified School District kept all schools closed this week for its 14,000 students. It offered self-directed online activities but said the work was optional.

Between 1,200 and 2,000 students in Pasadena Unified School District are known to be displaced but the number could be as high as as 10,000 based on heat maps of where families lived, district Superintendent Elizabeth Blanco said Thursday. The district aims to reopen some schools by the end of next week and have all students back in classrooms by the end of the month.

Schools that did not burn down were damaged by falling trees, debris, ash and smoke that requires extensive cleaning and environmental testing, she said. Hundreds of school staff members citywide lost their homes or had to relocate, compounding the challenges.

Some schools are passing on online learning altogether.

“We all did COVID. We did online instruction. We saw the negative impacts,” said Bonnie Brimecombe, principal of Odyssey Charter School-South, which burned to the ground. Families have been dropping their children off at the local Boys and Girls Club so students can be with each other, she said.

A total of 850 students attend her school and a sister school in Altadena, Odyssey Charter School-North, which emerged undamaged but is still expected to remain closed for months. At least 40% of the students lost their homes in the fire, she said, making it especially urgent for their well-being to find new space and resume school as soon as possible. “At this point we are trying to reopen in-person the very first day that we can,” she said.

Possible long-term effects

Over the long term, disruptions can have profound effects on students’ learning and emotional stability.

Children who experience natural disasters are more prone to acute illness and symptoms of depression and anxiety, research shows.

Keeping students together as the two LAUSD elementary schools are doing is the best approach, said Douglas Harris, a Tulane Univeristy professor who studied the effects of Hurricane Katrina on schools and academic outcomes. But given how many people are relocating because of the fires, he said it’s unlikely all classes will look the same.

“I wonder how many kids are showing up to the new school buildings based on how dispersed they might be,” Harris said. “It’s going to be difficult and it’s going to take a long time.”

‘I feel so out of it’

Among the schools seeking space for temporary classrooms is Palisades Charter High School, which has 3,000 students. Nestled between Sunset Boulevard and the Pacific Coast Highway, “Pali High” is the kind of California school that Hollywood puts on the big screen and has been featured in productions including the 1976 horror movie “Carrie” and the TV series “Teen Wolf.”

Most of the buildings are still standing, but about 40% of the campus was damaged, officials said. The school is looking into other campuses, nearby universities and commercial real estate spaces that would allow all its students to stay together until it’s safe to return, said principal and executive director Pamela Magee. The school delayed the start of the second semester until Tuesday and will temporarily revert to online learning.

Axel Forrest, 18, a junior on the lacrosse team, is planning to gather with friends for online school. His family home is gone and for now they are at a hotel near the Los Angeles airport.

“I feel so out of it, every day. Do I cry? Do I mourn the loss of my home and school? I am trying not to think about it,” he said. The longer school is out, the more idle time his mind has to wander.

“As time is passing I’m realizing this is going to be my reality for the next year or two. I am not going to have anywhere to live permanently for a while,” he said. “And what am I going to do for school now? It’s going to be online but for how long? Where will the temporary campus be? How far away is it?”

At Oak Knoll Montessori, educators have been holding meetups for its 150 students at locations including museums, parks, and a library in an effort for students to find some joy. The fire destroyed the school and several dozen students lost their homes.

The only thing that survived the fire was the school’s chicken coop, and its five chickens.

“The chickens have been a nice beacon of hope,” said Allwyn Fitzpatrick, the head of school. “All the buildings blew up. We have nothing. Not one chair.”

Fitzpatrick has found a potential new location for the school and hopes to reopen before the end of the month.

“We have been trying to focus all our attention on the children and how we can temporarily help them normalize all this. Which is an insurmountable task,” Fitzpatrick said.
…

The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his iconic “I Have a Dream” speech in 1963 on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. He chose that location in part to honor President Abraham Lincoln as “a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today.” Now, millions of people honor King in the same way.

On the third Monday of January — close to King’s Jan. 15 birthday — federal, state and local governments, institutions and various industries recognize Martin Luther King Jr. Day. For some, the holiday is just that — time off from work or school. But, King’s family and others carrying on his legacy of equality, justice and non-violent protest want Americans to remember that this holiday is really about helping others.

While it is now a time-honored tradition, the establishment of the holiday had a prolonged, difficult path to acceptance.

How the idea for MLK day began

The idea to establish a national holiday for the civil rights icon arose as the nation was plunged into grief. U.S. Democratic Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, one of the longest-serving members of Congress known for his liberal stance on civil rights, proposed legislation to recognize King four days after his assassination outside a motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968.

Supporters knew it would not be easy. King, who was 39 years old at the time, was a polarizing figure to half the country even before his death, said Lerone Martin, director of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute at Stanford University. Polls conducted by the Washington Post and the New York Times indicated most Americans did not trust King or thought he was too radical because of his speeches on poverty, housing and against the Vietnam War.

“People say that King is moving too fast after 1965 and basically ‘Hey, you got the Voting Rights bill done. That’s enough,'” Martin said.

The Congressional Black Caucus, founded by Conyers, tried to bring the legislation up for a vote for the next 15 years. Among the Republican rebuttals — public holidays don’t apply to private citizens, King was a communist or King was a womanizer. In the meantime, his widow, Coretta Scott King, kept lobbying for it. Musician Stevie Wonder even released a song, “Happy Birthday,” to rally support.

So, what changed?

By the 1980s, the social and cultural climate in the U.S. had shifted and the public was reflecting on racial progress, Martin said. Most Americans now were also regretting the Vietnam War. Supporters, meanwhile, were still calling for federal holiday status.

In 1983, about 20 years after King’s “I Have a Dream” speech, legislation for a Martin Luther King Jr. Day on the third Monday of January cleared Congress and President Ronald Reagan signed it.

States held back as activists stepped up

Reagan’s signing did not lead other Republicans to follow. It would be 17 more years until all 50 states observed it. Most of the foot-dragging came from the South — except for Arizona. Then in 1987, Gov. Evan Mecham rescinded his predecessor’s executive order enacting a state holiday in Arizona.

“He said ‘Black people don’t need a holiday. Y’all need jobs,'” recalled Dr. Warren H. Stewart Sr., senior pastor at First Institutional Baptist Church in Phoenix. “That started the war.”

Stewart launched a group to lead “people of all colors and all persuasions, faiths and parties” in protest marches. Entertainers including Wonder canceled Arizona events. Companies moved conventions. The tipping point was the loss of hosting the Super Bowl. In 1992, Arizona became the first state where voter initiative reinstated the King holiday.

Supporters took a victory lap the next MLK Day with a packed arena concert attended by Wonder and other artists. Even Rosa Parks was there. Stewart remembers speaking to the crowd.

“What I said there — and it still applies today — we’ve won the holiday but the holiday is a symbol of liberty and justice for all and we must move from symbol to substance,” he said.

South Carolina was the final holdout until 2000. But, it was without the backing of the civil rights groups because it also allowed for a Confederate Memorial Day.

A ‘day on, not a day off’

Martin Luther King Jr. Day’s reach has only grown in its 42 years.

It’s the only federal holiday where you take a “day on, not a day off.” In 1994, President Bill Clinton signed into law Congressman John Lewis and Sen. Harris Wofford’s legislation making it a National Day of Service.

Just about every major city and suburb has some revelry the weekend before, including parades, street festivals and concerts. The various service projects run the gamut — community clean-up, packing food boxes, donating blood.

AmeriCorps, the federal agency that deploys volunteers to serve communities around the nation, has distributed $1.5 million in grants to 200 nonprofits, faith-based groups and other organizations for projects. CEO Michael Smith estimates there have been hundreds of projects involving hundreds of thousands of people for MLK day in recent years. Engagement seems to be expanding.

“You know, any given day I see another project that has nothing to do with us,” said Smith, who has served in President Joe Biden’s administration. “What’s so important about the King holiday is not only the service that’s going to happen, but how it creates a spark for people to think about how maybe they’re going to serve all year long.”

That’s something King’s daughter, the Rev. Bernice King and CEO of the King Center in Atlanta, desires as well. She wishes people would do more than “quote King, which we love to do.” They need to do good work and commit daily “to embrace the spirit of nonviolence.”

Martin also thinks it’s important to learn about the man himself. He finds excitement in seeing people read or hear about the Nobel Peace Prize winner. But, nothing compares to taking in King’s own writings such as his 1963 “Letter from the Birmingham Jail,” he added.

“We can arm ourselves with his ideals,” Martin said. “We can continue to have a conversation with him — not just on one day but actually throughout the year.”
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A former CIA analyst pleaded guilty Friday in federal court in Virginia to charges that he leaked classified information about Israeli plans to strike Iran. 

Asif William Rahman, 34, of Vienna, Virginia, was arrested last year in Cambodia and later taken to Guam. He faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison on each of the two charges: retention and transmission of classified information related to the national defense.

Rahman had worked for the intelligence agency since 2016 and had a top-secret security clearance. 

Prosecutors said Rahman illegally downloaded and printed classified documents at work and then took the documents home, where he altered the items to cover up the source of the information before distributing it.

The secret information was eventually published on the Telegram social media platform.

A Justice Department statement said that beginning in the spring of 2024 and lasting until November, Rahman shared the “top-secret information” he learned at his job with “multiple individuals he knew were not entitled to receive it.” 

“Government employees who are granted security clearances and given access to our nation’s classified information must promise to protect it,” Robert Wells, executive assistant director of the FBI’s National Security Branch, said Friday in a statement.  

“Rahman blatantly violated that pledge and took multiple steps to hide his actions. The FBI will use all our resources to investigate and hold accountable those who illegally transmit classified information and endanger the national security interests of our country,” Wells said.  

The Justice Department said Rahman destroyed journal entries and written work products on his personal electronic devices “to conceal his personal opinions on U.S. policy and drafted entries to construct a false narrative regarding his activity.”  He also destroyed several other electronic devices, including an internet router that the Justice Department said Rahman “used to transmit classified information and photographs of classified documents, and discarded the destroyed devices in public trash receptacles in an effort to thwart potential investigations into him and his unlawful conduct.”   

The Associated Press reported that Rahman was born in California but grew up in Cincinnati and graduated from Yale University after only three years.   

Rahman is scheduled to be sentenced May 15.

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters.
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