Author: potus

Itay Svirsky, 40, was a therapist who loved philosophy. Eden Yerushalmi, 24, was training to become a Pilates instructor. Alex Lobanov, 32, a father of three, never met his youngest child.They are among the 41 hostages killed since being taken captive by Hamas and its allies during their Oct. 7 attack on Israel, according to an analysis by The New York Times of forensic reports and military investigations into their deaths, as well as interviews with more than a dozen Israeli soldiers and officials, a senior regional official and seven relatives of hostages.Some were killed by Hamas, some by Israeli…

Meta’s Facebook’s influence remains strong globally, but younger users are logging in less. Only 32% of U.S. teens use Facebook today, down from 71% in 2014, according to a 2024 Pew Research study. However, Facebook’s resale platform Marketplace is one reason young people are on the platform.”I only use Facebook for Marketplace,” said Mirka Arevalo, a student at Buffalo University. “I go in knowing what I want, not just casually browsing.”Launched in 2016, Facebook Marketplace has grown into one of Meta’s biggest success stories. With 1.1 billion users across 70 countries, it competes with eBay and Craigslist, according to BusinessDasher.”Marketplace…

North Korea said on Saturday that it was building its first nuclear-powered submarine to enhance its nuclear weapons abilities, and the state news media showed the nation’s leader, Kim Jong-un, inspecting part of what appeared to be a new submarine larger than any owned by the country.The announcement, made in the state news media, came as United States and South Korean officials feared that the North may be receiving technological help from Russia to help modernize its military in return for sending troops and conventional weapons to help in its war against Ukraine.Mr. Kim “learned about the building of a…

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said he rejects a U.S. push for talks between the two countries because they would be aimed at imposing restrictions on Iranian missile range and its influence in the region.Speaking to a group of officials on Saturday, Khamenei did not identify the United States by name but said a “bullying government” was being persistent in its push for talks. “Their talks are not aimed at solving problems, it is for … let’s talk to impose what we want on the other party that is sitting on the opposite side of…

The same day Geslain Luma, a 29-year-old Haitian immigrant, learned he was granted temporary protected status to remain in the United States was the same day President Donald Trump announced plans to cut the program short.Figuring out his future with “the end of TPS gives me a headache,” Luma said.For more than 15 years, TPS has allowed thousands of Haitians to work legally in the U.S. and avoid deportation while their homeland grapples with political instability, gang violence and economic hardship.Since the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse in 2021, armed gangs have gained control over much of Port-au-Prince, creating a…

My father spoke only once to me about why he wanted to be president of the United States. It was the night of his inauguration in 1981. I had been assigned to one of the inaugural balls and was supposed to wait there for my parents to arrive. After sitting onstage, on a metal folding chair with a crowd of people staring up at me for what felt like an hour, I broke the rules and left. Lying awake in the Lincoln Bedroom, I hoped Lincoln’s ghost would visit me, as he has been said to have visited others in…

There is a certain tension in the way that American conservatism looks at Europe. On the one hand, Donald Trump and his allies insist that European countries need to step up, behave like serious world powers, and take on much more military responsibility.On the other hand, many American right-wingers display contempt for a continent they regard as impotent, decadent and basically doomed. And they have a special contempt for the current structure through which Europeans act in concert, the bureaucratized pseudo-confederacy (see, I’m expressing contempt myself) of the European Union.As a consequence, American conservatives tend to sympathize with European parties…

Between the U.S. tariff “psychodrama,” or, per Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s quip, “Thursday,” and the growing evidence that President Trump’s threats of Canada’s sovereignty are quite serious, it’s been a stressful time for Canadians who are looking for stability.That may not come quite yet. Even as Liberal Party members overcome registration problems to vote on Mr. Trudeau’s successor at the helm of the party and the country, a federal election looms.The protracted instability — one that could yield three Canadian prime ministers in one year — is reflected in opinion research, where voters’ views on who is best to manage…

Russian strikes killed 20 people in the war-torn eastern Ukrainian region of Donetsk on Friday night, a sign that Moscow is stepping up bombardments of cities critical for Ukrainian logistics and support and taking advantage of Washington’s decision to pause military aid and intelligence sharing with Kyiv.President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said on Facebook on Saturday that Russian forces had fired two ballistic missiles into the small city of Dobropillia, and that after emergency services arrived, another Russian attack had rained down on the rescuers. The strikes killed 11 people in the city, according to Vadym Filashkin, the head of…

In early 2017, American intelligence agencies delivered an unequivocal judgment about why President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had ordered a sprawling effort to sabotage the recent American presidential election.Mr. Putin wanted to cripple the faith Americans have in their own elections, they found, and to undermine a United States-led “liberal world order” that the Russians see as a threat to their security. As a way to achieve this goal, the assessment found, Russia worked to help Donald J. Trump win the election.Eight years later, Mr. Trump sat in the Oval Office for a blustery meeting with President Voldymyr Zelensky…