CNN
Jun 1, 2024

Domestic pressure mounts for Netanyahu

Netanyahu is facing domestic pressure, both from opposition leaders to get a ceasefire agreement on the table, and from ministers within his own party not to back down on Israel’s original war goals. Families of Israelis being held hostage are meanwhile urging him to accept the proposal.

Protesters took to the streets of several cities across Israel on Saturday, demanding Netanyahu’s resignation and for early elections to be held.

They also demanded the release of all hostages held in Gaza and for the Israeli government to accept the latest proposal laid out by Biden.

Families of hostages held in Gaza took part in protests in Tel Aviv, Caesaria, Haifa, Herzeliya, Kfar Saba.

At Hostage Square in Tel Aviv, protesters called the names of the 125 hostages still in Hamas captivity.

“Start streaming this deal, so that it will start moving… Start working, start acting,” a woman in Tel Aviv shouted over a loudspeaker.

In Caesarea, protesters called for Netanyahu to accept the hostage release deal that Biden presented.

“There is no victory until every last hostage is returned,” people chanted.

Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid wrote on X Saturday that Israel’s government “cannot ignore President Biden’s significant speech.”

Lapid said he was offering Netanyahu a “safety net,” saying he would support him in securing a hostage deal if far-right ministers Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich left the government.


https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/01/europe/netenyahu-ceasefire-hamas-contradiction-biden-intl/index.html

Times of Israel
Jun 1, 2024

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Saturday there would be no “permanent ceasefire” in Gaza until Hamas’s military and governing capabilities were destroyed.

His comments, in a rare statement published on the Sabbath and only in English, came after United States President Joe Biden announced Friday that Israel had proposed a three-phase deal for a ceasefire in Gaza in exchange for Hamas releasing hostages, told the terror group to accept it and urged the Israeli government to stand behind it.

“Israel’s conditions for ending the war have not changed: The destruction of Hamas military and governing capabilities, the freeing of all hostages and ensuring that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel,” Netanyahu said.

Biden described the proposal as originating with Israel and laid out the details of a three-phase deal, with particular emphasis on the first phase, a six-week truce that could be extended if talks took longer

A US official later said the Israeli proposal was a highly detailed four-and-a-half-page document. It was apparently approved by the war cabinet — compromising Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and minister Benny Gantz — but presumably not yet presented to the wider security cabinet, of which far-fight ministers Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich are members, and on whose support Netanyahu depends for his coalition’s majority.

Immediately after the speech,  Netanyahu — whom Biden avoided naming — released an initial statement saying that “The Israeli government is united in the desire to return our hostages as soon as possible and is working to achieve this goal.”


https://www.timesofisrael.com/non-starter-netanyahu-says-no-permanent-gaza-ceasefire-until-hamas-destroyed/

Netanyahu accepts invitation to address joint session of Congress
TOI, Jun 1, 2024

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday accepted an invitation to address a joint session of Congress.

He said that he was “excited for the privilege to present in front of the representatives of the American people and the entire world the truth about our just war against those who wish to kill us.”

The statement from the Prime Minister’s Office boasted that he would be the first world leader to address a joint session of Congress for a fourth time. He is currently tied at three with Britain’s wartime prime minister, Winston Churchill.

No date has been set, but the speech is expected to take place “as soon as the next eight weeks or soon after August recess,” a source familiar with the matter told The Hill.

An official familiar with the matter told The Times of Israel that Netanyahu had been speaking in recent weeks to Republican Congressional leaders about a potential joint session address, viewing it as an opportunity to make Israel’s case on the global stage and is less concerned about some of the political fallout within the US.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/netanyahu-accepts-invitation-to-address-joint-session-of-congress/

O'Bama posted this on X

Collin Rugg
@CollinRugg
NEW: Alvin Bragg's former colleague and current CNN legal analyst is calling out the rigged Trump case, even accusing Judge Juan Merchan of violating the law.
 
Elie Honig says the trial "blew his mind" as he called it an "unjustified mess."
 
"The judge donated money - a tiny amount of $35, but in plain violation of a rule prohibiting New York judges from making political donations of any kind to a pro-Biden, anti-Trump political operation," he wrote in the NY Magazine.

"The charges against Trump are obscure and nearly entirely unprecedented. In fact, no state prosecutor... has ever charged federal election laws as a direct or predicate state crime, against anyone, for anything."

"None. Ever. Even putting aside the specifics of election law, the Manhattan DA itself almost never brings any case in which falsification of business records is the only charge."

https://x.com/CollinRugg/status/1796908958453760177

I’ve had January mornings that were so cold that even turning the heaters full blast in my vehicle, it never warms up inside of it


One of the privileges of living up in the north country