Crooked Media - What A Day: Striking fear

Violence continues to bubble over in the Middle East.
 

• Pakistan launched retaliatory ballistic strikes against militants in Iran on Thursday, two days after Iran said it struck the headquarters of another group in Pakistani territory. Pakistan’s attack days earlier killed at least nine people, including four children. Iran’s foreign ministry said on Thursday it was committed to maintaining good relations with Pakistan, but called on the Pakistani government to prevent the establishment of “terrorist bases” within its borders. Both countries expressed the desire to avert further escalation. 
   

• In Washington, President Joe Biden said on Thursday that the clashes between Iran and Pakistan this week demonstrate that Iran, a U.S. adversary, is not well-liked in the region. Washington carried out its fifth round of airstrikes in Yemen on Thursday against Houthi militants. When asked by reporters if he thought the strikes against Houthi targets were working, Biden said: “Well, when you say, ‘working,’ are they stopping the Houthis? No. Are they gonna continue? Yes.” Well okay then! Pentagon Deputy Press Secretary Sabrina Singh later told reporters: “We are not at war with the Houthis. Actions we are taking are defensive in nature.”
   

• Lebanese militant group Hezbollah rebuffed U.S. proposals that could lead to a cooldown in fighting with neighboring Israel, such as withdrawing its fighters further from the border. But the group said it remains open to American diplomacy to prevent a more damaging regional war. A senior Lebanese official said: “Hezbollah is ready to listen,” while at the same time emphasizing that the group feels the State Department’s latest round of proposals is unrealistic. Attacks from Yemen’s Houthi militants, who like Hezbollah are also backed by Iran, add to the urgency of these negotiations.

The recent spate of intensifying conflicts in the Middle East have in part sprung out of the catastrophic violence between Israel and Hamas that began on October 7. It shows no signs of slowing. 
 

• At a Thursday news conference, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu again rejected the proposal of a postwar peace plan that would result in the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state. Even working towards such a goal, he said, was out of the question. “Israel must have security over all the territory west of the Jordan,” Netanyahu said, referring to the Jordan River. “This clashes with the idea of sovereignty. What can you do?” President Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken have made their support for a two-state solution clear, and Biden has suggested that a “revitalized” Palestinian Authority run post-Hamas Gaza, as it currently runs the West Bank. 
   

• A one-state solution, in which Israelis and Palestinians would live in one democratic state (incorporating Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza) with full rights for both groups, is favored by many Palestinians. But it’s opposed by many Israelis on the right, as under this plan, Jewish Israelis would be outnumbered by Arab Muslims. Netanyahu and other right-wing Israelis have tacitly or explicitly expressed support for a one-state solution of their own, which could involve annexation of the West Bank and the disenfranchisement of Palestinians—or simply forcing them out entirely. This option is rejected by not only virtually the whole world, but also most Israelis. In the past, Netanyahu has drawn criticism for declaring that Israel is “the national state, not of all its citizens, but only of the Jewish people.”  
   

Netanyahu said he would not compromise on Israel’s goal of “total victory” over Hamas, and told the public to prepare for months more of fighting. 

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The Justice Department issued a damning 575-page report on Thursday on police failures during the 2022 mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, TX. Attorney General Merrick Garland read from the report in front of families of victims, who bowed their heads and passed around a tissue box. Garland also told the families that the significant delay from police in confronting the gunman also delayed the medical response to the tragedy. “The report concludes that had law enforcement agencies followed generally accepted practices in an active shooter situation and gone right after the shooter to stop him, lives would have been saved and people would have survived,” Garland said. 

The report sharply criticizes local police higher-ups but also Texas state law enforcement, saying that its officers added to the disorganization and confusion that contributed to the delays and indecision that cost so many lives. One particularly scathing part of the report details that police officers spent about 40 minutes searching for a key to the classroom where the gunman had planted himself among dozens of children, when the classroom was probably unlocked the whole time. Police never tried to simply turn the doorknob. The notification process to communicate with the families of victims who had died was also “disorganized” and “chaotic,” according to the report. Garland described the law enforcement response in the hours and days following the shooting as “a failure.” Nineteen students and two teachers were killed that day.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) suggested on Wednesday forced birth for women would “fill jobs” and solve the “population problem” in the United States during a House Oversight Committee hearing on immigration on Wednesday. Cool. Great. No word yet on how America will solve the Marjorie Taylor Greene problem. 

The Georgia judge presiding over the Fulton County racketeering and election interference case against disgraced former president Donald Trump has set a hearing date of February 15 for misconduct allegations against District Attorney Fani Willis from one of Trump’s co-defendants. 

An email exchange obtained by The New York Times shows that Trump’s lawyers in the Fulton County case got into a tense electronic back-and-forth with Willis, whose office accused Trump’s counsel of being “disrespectful and condescending, lacking both professionalism and decorum.” Willis and one of her executive lawyers, who is also a Black woman, both suggested to Trump’s lawyers that “some people” are unable to treat Black women respectfully, a tacit accusation which Trump’s attorney called “offensive, uncalled for, and untrue.” 

House Republicans concluded their sham impeachment hearings against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Thursday.

Florida’s state Board of education announced a new mandate on Wednesday banning public colleges from using state or federal funds for diversity, equity, and inclusion programs as part of the administration of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ absolutely pathetic “War on Woke.” 

Another Arctic blast is pushing south towards much of the United States, particularly the Midwest, bringing low temperatures and high wind chill to millions of Americans. 

Hunter Biden agreed to appear for a closed-door deposition in front of House Republicans as part of their ongoing nonsense attempts to dig up dirt on Hunter’s dad, President Biden.

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Congress passed a Continuing Resolution to fund the government through early March and avoid a partial government shutdown on Thursday, sending it to President Biden. 

Spelman College in Georgia announced it had received a $100 million donation, the largest-ever single donation to a Historically Black College or University. 

U.S. weekly jobless claims reached their lowest levels since September 2022.