Monthly Archives: March 2025

Deadly Israeli strikes mar Gaza Eid celebrations as Netanyahu says pressure on Hamas is ‘working’

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Make no mistake. This is one of the atrocities of our time as Americans look the other way. Yes Israel was viciously attacked on October 7, 1923. But the response against Gaza (almost 50,000 confirmed civilian deaths) is frightfully disproportionate to the attacks). Most Palestinians (including the 10,000 + children killed) did not even know about the Hamas invasion of Israel at that time. Both the Biden and Trump administrations sent aid to Israel while this was going on. The Israelis do not need money for American weapons. The Palestinians in Gaza do need food, water and medical help.

By Eyad Kourdi, Ibrahim Dahman, Mohammad al-Sawalhi and Sophie Tanno, CNN

 4 minute read 

Updated 11:52 AM EDT, Sun March 30, 2025

Victims of an Israeli strike on the Al-Mawasi area of Khan Younis Sunday are laid to rest.

Victims of an Israeli strike on the Al-Mawasi area of Khan Younis Sunday are laid to rest. Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu via Getty ImagesCNN — 

Israeli airstrikes on a tent and a home housing displaced people in southern Gaza killed 10 people Sunday, including children, as Palestinians observed the first day of Eid-al-Fitr, rescuers said.

The Israeli military is stepping up its renewed campaign in Gaza, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying efforts to pressure Hamas into releasing more hostages were “working” and vowing to implement Donald Trump’s hugely controversial scheme to relocate Palestinians from the territory.

Twenty people were also injured in the strike on the Al-Mawasi area, Khan Younis’s Director of Civil Defense Yamen Abu Suleiman told CNN, warning the death toll would likely rise.

A local hospital confirmed the fatalities so far, saying five children had been killed.

Video of the aftermath of the strike shows some of the child victims wearing new Eid clothing. In Middle Eastern tradition, children wear new clothes to celebrate the three-day holiday.

In the footage, a man is seen dragging a child toward the hospital, asking: “What was these children’s fault? They did nothing.”

CNN has approached the Israel Defense Forces for comment.

Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are observing Eid this year in the face of dwindling aid supplies and a mounting death toll in the strip.

“Every year, I’m used to baking Eid cookies for my children,” one displaced woman, Ameneh Shaqla, told CNN. “But because of the current situation and how expensive everything has become, I was only able to prepare one kilogram — just to bring them some joy so they don’t stay sad because of the war.”

Abdel Fattah Khalil Karnawi, a street vendor, told of the soaring prices for clothing. “We came to the market to get Eid clothes for the children. Unfortunately, the circumstances are tough and prices are very high.”

Bodies of Palestinians are brought to the Nasser Hospital by their relatives in Khan Younis Sunday.

Bodies of Palestinians are brought to the Nasser Hospital by their relatives in Khan Younis Sunday. Hani Alshaer/Anadolu via Getty Images

Israel resumed its offensive on Gaza almost two weeks ago, shattering a two-month-old ceasefire. It imposed a complete blockade of humanitarian aid entering the enclave, warning that its forces would maintain a permanent presence in parts of Gaza until the release of the remaining 24 hostages who are believed to still be alive. Hundreds of Palestinians have been killed in the enclave since then.

Al-Mawasi, a coastal region west of the city of Rafah, has repeatedly come under Israeli attacks, even though it was previously designated by Israel as a “humanitarian area.” Thousands of Palestinians have fled to Al-Mawasi, living for months in makeshift tents made of cloth and nylon, with little access to humanitarian relief.

In comments made on Sunday morning, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to step up the military campaign, saying the pressure on Hamas was “working.”

“It works because it operates simultaneously: on one hand, it crushes Hamas’ military and governmental capabilities and, on the other, it creates the conditions for the release of our hostages. This is exactly what we are doing,” Netanyahu said at a government meeting.

Rejecting assertions Israel was unwilling to negotiate, he added that “cracks” were showing in Hamas following the renewal of the offensive and said Israel would implement “the Trump Plan — the voluntary emigration plan,” a scheme Trump himself appears to have walked back on.

New ceasefire proposal

Sunday’s strike comes as Hamas has agreed to a new Egyptian proposal to release five hostages, including the American-Israeli Edan Alexander, in exchange for a renewed ceasefire, a Hamas source told CNN.

The proposal is similar to one presented several weeks ago by US special envoy Steve Witkoff, although it is not clear whether it also includes the release of additional bodies of deceased hostages.

In exchange for the release of five hostages, Hamas expects a return to phase 1 ceasefire conditions, including the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza, as well as an agreement from Israel to negotiate the second phase of the ceasefire, the source said.

Israel has responded to the Egyptian offer with a counter-proposal, according to a statement from the Israeli prime minister’s office.

“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu conducted a series of consultations yesterday, following a proposal received from the mediators. In recent hours, Israel transferred its counter-proposal to the mediators, in full coordination with the United States,” the office said.

Netanyahu is facing competing demands at home from his right-wing coalition who want to increase pressure on Hamas and families of the remaining hostages who fear more military action could endanger their loved ones.

This story has been updated.

CNN’s Jeremy Diamond and Tamar Michaelis contributed reporting.

In Averting a Shutdown, Schumer Ignites a Rebellion

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Mar 14, 2025 5:50 PM E

Philip Elliott

Philip Elliott

Elliott is a senior correspondent at TIME, based in the Washington, D.C., bureau.

Senate Takes Up Budget Bill Passed By House As Funding Deadline Looms
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) leaves the Democratic caucus lunch at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. on March 13, 2025.Kayla Bartkowski—Getty Images

This article is part of The D.C. Brief, TIME’s politics newsletter. Sign up here to get stories like this sent to your inbox.

The Senate’s move Friday to avoid a government shutdown—essentially ceding spending power to President Donald Trump and downgrading Congress to an advisory role—was an epic climbdown that is rightfully sending the Democrats’ base into a spiral.

The rage among Democrats trained on one figure: Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, who signaled a day earlier that the fight was over and it was time to move on. The choice was to hold open the doors of a scaled-down government or to slam it closed on what stood before, and the outcome tells the story.

That does not mean anyone in the party was happy about how this went down.

Asked Friday if it was time for a new Leadership team for Senate Democrats, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries declined to throw Schumer a life preserver. “Next question,” Jeffries said. In other spaces, there was an open talk of primarying Schumer when he is next on the ballot in 2028.

Nine Senate Democrats—and Independent Angus King of Maine who caucuses with them—joined all but one Senate Republican on Friday to sidestep a government shutdown. The stopgap spending plan gives the White House a freer hand to shutter dozens of federal functions created by Congress and eliminate thousands of jobs. Congress, at least through Sept. 30, is in effect legislating a stronger executive branch that can basically do anything with the money lawmakers release.

It was a crap ending to what’s been a crap week for Democrats, frankly. On top of all of the chaos unfurling from the Trump White House by way of new executive orders, hires, fires, and tariffs, they have also had to face this ticking clock of a government shutdown. House Republicans jammed Democrats with a party-line spending plan that is especially heinous in its cuts to the District of Columbia. Then, the House ditched town, giving the Senate zero say to tweak the spending. Then, Schumer on Wednesday asserted the framework had insufficient support to get across the finish line. And, then, a day later, he said he would support the spending structure to block a shutdown.

The whiplash from the shut-it-down to keep-it-alive posturing only fed the contempt that many Democrats were already harboring toward their current leaders.

“Whatever happens will happen,” said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, who was a “no” vote and used the hours ahead of the votes to telegraph a dark fatalism.

That resignation has been bleeding through Washington in recent weeks. The fight among anti-Trumpers of all stripes has faded in recent days as Trump’s brazen conquest of the spending system was looking increasingly inevitable. The chest-thumping celebrations in the White House and the antics of its pet-project DOGE intersected to rile up Democrats, who have been trying to defend all corners of the federal cogs.

Ultimately, though, the Democrats in a position to thwart Trump and his GOP allies caved. Republicans have majorities in the House and Senate, plus control of the White House. But Senate rules require 60 votes to get balls rolling, and Republicans had just 52 yes votes in the Upper Chamber. That meant GOP lawmakers needed to get eight converts among Democrats. 

Senate Democrats looked at the math, polling, and their own talents. They made the call that the mismatch of their desire to oppose Trump’s unilateral power grab did not match their ability to actually stop it. Poli-sci nerds will tell you that actual power lies at the point where will and capacity are synced up. Democrats had the power to shut down the government but lacked the bandwidth to sell it as the other guys’ fault, or put forth a unified plan on how to reopen the government on better terms.

The problem now lies with how Democrats deal with the Schumer sitch. They are very, very quiet at the moment, but there are the faintest of rumblings about whether Schumer gets to hold his position as Minority Leader for the balance of this term. Progressive and rank-and-file corners of the party alike were uneasy about this call, and steering this unruly ship into 2026 is a job that is not something to be taken lightly. 

To be clear: Schumer is not at risk of being deposed in short order, and Democrats do not carry House Republicans’ appetite for cannibalizing their own. Schumer acts on calculations, not confidences. His decision to side with keeping the government open at the expense of legislative branch power came from a place of rationality, not rashness. But it still carried costs, and the first among them was his standing with frustrated Democrats who want the opposition party to do its job: to oppose an administration hellbent on dismantling a government it holds in sheer contempt.

Government, for the moment, survives. Democrats, for the foreseeable future, find their ability to check Trump diminished. And, until Congress reverses itself, the legislative branch takes a secondary role to the executive. 

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Trump Doubles Metal Tariffs as He Presses Canada to Become Part of U.S.

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BLOG EDITOR: Canada Says it will have None of this! Let see if the delusional Donald will handle this. We are in an alternative universe from anything we’ve seen. The question is who will suffer more but for the U.S. more like what will this first wave of retaliation do to his odd and destructive administration.

The president said he would double tariffs set to go into effect on Wednesday and threatened further levies, as he ramps up economic pressure on America’s closest ally.

Ana Swanson

By Ana Swanson

Ana Swanson covers international trade and reported from Washington.

  • March 11, 2025Updated 11:23 a.m. ET

President Trump escalated his fight with Canada on Tuesday, saying that he would double tariffs on steel and aluminum imports and threatening to inflict even more pain on one of America’s closest traditional allies as he pressed Canada to become part of the United States.

His comments sent jittery markets tumbling, with the S&P 500 down about 1 percent in early morning trading.

In a post on his social media platform, Mr. Trump wrote that Canadian steel and aluminum would face a 50 percent tariff, double what he plans to charge on metals from other countries beginning Wednesday. He said the levies were in response to an additional charge that Ontario placed on electricity coming into the United States, and he threatened more tariffs if Canada didn’t drop various levies it imposes on U.S. dairy and agricultural products.

“If other egregious, long time Tariffs are not likewise dropped by Canada, I will substantially increase, on April 2nd, the Tariffs on Cars coming into the U.S. which will, essentially, permanently shut down the automobile manufacturing business in Canada,” he threatened.

Tariffs in Trump’s second term in office

As of March 6

StatusCountryDescription
In effectFeb. 4China10% on all imports ›
In effectMarch 4Mexico25% on all imports ›
In effectMarch 4Canada25% on most imports, lower rate for energy ›
In effectMarch 4ChinaAdditional 10% on all imports ›
SuspendedMarch 6Canada and MexicoReprieve for goods that fall under the USMCA trade pact ›
PlannedMarch 12World25% on aluminum and steel ›
PlannedMarch 12CanadaAdditional 25% on aluminum and steel ›
PlannedApril 2WorldUnspecified tariff on all agricultural products
PlannedApril 2WorldUnspecified tariff on all foreign cars ›

Source: Peterson Institute for International Economics, Wells Fargo Economic Insights 

The New York Times

Mr. Trump went on to say that “the only thing that makes sense” is for Canada to become the 51st U.S. state.

The moves will significantly escalate a confrontation with one of America’s largest trading partners, and call into question Mr. Trump’s intentions for one of its closest allies. Canadian officials first thought Mr. Trump’s idea of absorbing Canada into the United State was a joke, but they have more recently begun to take the president’s threats seriously.

Mr. Trump spent much of his social media post on Tuesday essentially cajoling Canada to become part of America, writing: “This would make all Tariffs, and everything else, totally disappear. Canadians taxes will be very substantially reduced, they will be more secure, militarily and otherwise, than ever before, there would no longer be a Northern Border problem, and the greatest and most powerful nation in the World will be bigger, better and stronger than ever — And Canada will be a big part of that.”

“The artificial line of separation drawn many years ago will finally disappear, and we will have the safest and most beautiful Nation anywhere in the World,” he added.

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President Trump said Canadian steel and aluminum would face a 50 percent tariff when coming into the United States.Credit…Nick Iwanyshyn/The Canadian Press, via Associated Press

Last week, Mr. Trump hit Canada and Mexico with sweeping 25 percents on all imports, before walking some — but not all — of those levies back a few days later.

Mr. Trump said the higher metal tariffs on Canada would be a response to a surcharge on electricity it exports to the United States. On Monday, Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, retaliated against Mr. Trump’s tariffs by adding a 25 percent surcharge to the electricity it exports to Michigan, Minnesota and New York.

Canada is in the middle of a political transition as it prepares to swear in a new prime minister, Mark Carney, an economist and central banker, to replace Justin Trudeau, who announced in January that he would be resigning after almost 10 years in office. Mr. Trump’s move would punish the entire country for a retaliation measure taken on by one province.

Vjosa Isai and Danielle Kaye contributed reporting.

Ana Swanson covers trade and international economics for The Times and is based in Washington. She has been a journalist for more than a decade. More about Ana Swanson

A Day of American Infamy

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Opinion– So much has been written about this dark episode. That it was a dark day for Americans. (READ BELOW). A vital part of understanding this MAGA Republican stunt is that one has to understand: A.) What’s New? A rare look, not on the campaign rally circuit, not a tweet, not an interview.

The tag team bullying from Trump alone removes any doubt that we have to deal with something never seen before: A president with a diagnosable neurotic: narcissistic, angry, grandiose, bullying personality and persona. Not psychotic, as far as we can tell, but a bundle of neuroses so transparent and palpable that we, unformal an informed or simply interested public that might now be a voting majority (too slight) recognizes the trouble we are in.

Here we are talking about a common sense diagnosis because we are unlikely to have a medical one. But like Justice Potter Stewart on pornography we can’t define it be we know it when we see it.

B. ) on Policy Trump’s desire for a cease fire and talks is not inherently bad If it results in the saving of Ukrainian lives and widespread destruction of their country. NATO membership for Ukraine should be completely off the table, unless the United States wants to allow Russia to annex parts of Mexico.

I’ll stop here because of the oceans of electronic and print ink spilled on everything Trump, the sheer embarrassments and now outrages. These were promised during the 2024 campaign, Trump won by 1%, and now we are faced with the results: promises kept. If there were a parliamentary election (a fantasy) today in America Trump might win very slightly but if a Referendum he would not. The question is not If the regime will implode but when.

It’s no exaggeration to repeat the obvious: Trump is overplaying his hand. He’ll always have lapdogs like Lindsey Graham, but as public outrage even in the 55% range and getting hotter this will implode. Right now it may seem like a slow drip of bone-headed actions (take your pick: “Gulf of America? or a tax policy tilted toward the wealthy) , but the die is cast and the idea of a Gotterdammerung is too complimentary. The thugs are both the coterie around Trump and some, not all, of the people he has enabled: the Rudy Giuliani’s and the freed by pardon of then naive hoodlums that stormed the Capitol 4+ years ago. [I did not, could not stop where I indicated Above]

Bret Stephens

Feb. 28, 2025

In a black-and-white photo in the Oval Office, President Trump and Vice President JD Vance wave their hands dismissively at President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine.
Credit…Andrew Harni
Bret Stephens

By Bret Stephens

Opinion Columnist NEW YORK TIMES

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In August 1941, about four months before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Franklin Roosevelt met with Winston Churchill aboard warships in Newfoundland’s Placentia Bay and agreed to the Atlantic Charter, a joint declaration by the world’s leading democratic powers on “common principles” for a postwar world.

Among its key points: “no aggrandizement, territorial or other”; “sovereign rights and self-government restored to those who have been forcibly deprived of them”; “freedom from fear and want”; freedom of the seas; “access, on equal terms, to the trade and to the raw materials of the world which are needed for their economic prosperity.”

The charter, and the alliance that came of it, is a high point of American statesmanship. On Friday in the Oval Office, the world witnessed the opposite. Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s embattled democratic leader, came to Washington prepared to sign away anything he could offer President Trump except his nation’s freedom, security and common sense. For that, he was rewarded with a lecture on manners from the most mendacious vulgarian and ungracious host ever to inhabit the White House.

If Roosevelt had told Churchill to sue for peace on any terms with Adolf Hitler and to fork over Britain’s coal reserves to the United States in exchange for no American security guarantees, it might have approximated what Trump did to Zelensky. Whatever one might say about how Zelensky played his cards poorly — either by failing to behave with the degree of all-fours sycophancy that Trump demands or to maintain his composure in the face of JD Vance’s disingenuous provocations — this was a day of American infamy.

Where do we go from here?

If there’s one silver lining to this fiasco, it’s that Zelensky did not sign the agreement on Ukrainian minerals that was forced on him this month by Scott Bessent, the Treasury secretary who’s the Tom Hagen character in this protection-racket administration. The United States is entitled to some kind of reward for helping Ukraine defend itself — and Ukraine’s destruction of much of Russia’s military might should top the list, followed by the innovation Ukraine demonstrated in pioneering revolutionary forms of low-cost drone warfare, which the Pentagon will be keen to emulate.

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But if it’s a financial payback that the Trump administration seeks, the best place to get it is to seize, in collaboration with our European partners, Russia’s frozen assets and put them into an account by which Ukraine could pay for American-made arms. If the United States won’t do this, the Europeans should: Let the Ukrainians rely for their arms on Dassault, Saab, Rheinmetall, BAE Systems and other European defense contractors and see how that goes over with the “America First”-ers. Hopefully that could serve as another spur to Europeans to invest, as quickly and heavily as they can, in their depleted militaries, not simply to strengthen NATO but also to hedge against its end.

There is a second opportunity: While Trump’s abuse of Zelensky might delight the MAGA crowd, it isn’t likely to play well with most voters, including the almost 30 percent of Republicans who, even now, believe it’s in our interest to stand with Ukraine. And while most Americans may want to see the war in Ukraine end, they almost surely don’t want to see it end on Vladimir Putin’s terms.

Nor should the Trump administration. A Russian victory in Ukraine, including a cease-fire that allows Moscow to consolidate its gains and recoup its strength before the next assault, will have precisely the same effect as the Taliban’s victory in Afghanistan: emboldening American enemies to behave more aggressively. Notice that, as Trump has ratcheted up pressure on Ukraine in recent weeks, Taiwan reported a surge in Chinese military drills around the island, while Chinese warships held live-fire exercises off the coast of Vietnam and came within 150 nautical miles of Sydney.

Those are points honorable conservatives should press: Can Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and Representative Don Bacon of Nebraska — two Republicans who haven’t sold their souls on Ukraine — lead a delegation of like-minded conservatives to Kyiv?

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More so, this should be an opportunity for Democrats. Joe Biden was right when he called this a “decisive decade” for the future of the free world; he just happened to be too feeble and cautious a messenger.

But there are tough-minded Democrats with military and security backgrounds — Representative Jason Crow of Colorado, Representative Seth Moulton of Massachusetts and Senator Elissa Slotkin of Michigan come to mind — who can restore the spirit of Harry Truman and John F. Kennedy to the Democratic Party. It’s a message of toughness and freedom they might also be able to sell to at least some Trump voters, who cast their ballots in November for the sake of a better America, not a greater Russia.

Still, there’s no getting around the fact that Friday was a dreadful day — dreadful for Ukraine, for the free world, for the legacy of an America that once stood for the principles of the Atlantic Charter.

Roosevelt and Reagan must be spinning in their graves, as are Churchill and Thatcher. It’s up to the rest of us to reclaim America’s honor from the gangsters who besmirched it in the White House.

More on President Trump, Vladimir Putin and Ukraine

Opinion | Thomas L. Friedman

The Disturbing Question at the Heart of the Trump-Zelensky Drama

Feb. 25, 2025

Opinion | Bret Stephens

America’s Most Shameful Vote Ever at the U.N.

Feb. 25, 2025

Opinion | Dana H. Allin and Jonathan Stevenson

America and Russia Are on the Same Side Now

Feb. 25, 2025

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Bret Stephens is an Opinion columnist for The Times, writing about foreign policy, domestic politics and cultural issues. Facebook