House Minority Leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., sent House Democrats a letter Monday announcing the formation of a rapid response team and litigation group to ‘push back against the far-right extremism’ since President Donald Trump took office.
In the ‘Dear Colleague’ letter, Jeffries wrote, ‘I write with respect to our ongoing effort to push back against the far-right extremism that is being relentlessly unleashed on the American people.’
Jeffries characterized the political landscape as ‘a multifaceted struggle to protect and defend everyday Americans from the harm being inflicted by this administration.’
The letter states House Democrats have as a result officially established a Rapid Response Task Force and Litigation Working Group chaired by Colorado Democratic Rep. Joe Neguse.
Jeffries said that Democrats would continue to be ‘committed to driving down the high cost of living for everyday Americans.’ He criticized House Republicans for continuing to ‘launch far-right attacks on Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public safety and the education of our children,’ saying the American people were ‘counting’ on Democrats to stop them.
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House, Jeffries’ office and Neguse’s office for comment but did not immediately hear back.
Jeffries responded to a Fox News inquiry about the task force, saying, ‘It’s been an ongoing effort to push back against far-right extremism.’
Jeffries told Fox that ‘not a single thing that [Republicans have] actually done is a matter of law right now’ and said such actions suggest Republicans are ‘in disarray.’
Jeffries, along with House Democrat colleagues, have unveiled efforts to resist the president’s agenda since Trump took office in mid-January.
Just last week, House Democrats announced legislation that seeks to secure the personal data of Americans amid the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) spending sweep.
The legislation, titled the Taxpayer Data Protection Act, was revealed Thursday to ‘shield the American people from this out-of-control power grab, permanently, and make sure that the financial, personal, medical, and confidential information of the American people is protected.’
Elon Musk’s DOGE team has spent the last several weeks identifying ‘wasteful’ spending within various governmental agencies.
DOGE became the target of various lawsuits in the weeks following its establishment. A federal New York judge on Saturday ruled to block DOGE officials from accessing personal data such as social security numbers and bank account numbers.
Trump’s Justice Department railed against the order, calling it an ‘anti-Constitutional’ ruling.
Vice President JD Vance also called the ruling unconstitutional on X, saying it was an example of judicial overreach.
‘If a judge tried to tell a general how to conduct a military operation, that would be illegal. If a judge tried to command the attorney general in how to use her discretion as a prosecutor, that’s also illegal. Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power,’ Vance wrote Sunday.
Fox News’ Kelly Phares, Tyler Olson, Aubrie Spady, and Anders Hagstrom contributed to this report.
A group of House Republicans is pushing to give President Donald Trump more control over the federal spending process, as his administration continues to crack down on funding that does not align with the GOP agenda.
Rep. Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., is leading legislation to repeal the Impoundment Control Act, a 1974 Nixon-era law aimed at stopping the president from having unilateral say over government spending.
It would give Trump greater ability to accomplish his goals for Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Clyde told Fox News Digital in an interview.
‘I think it goes hand in hand with what DOGE is doing right now and with what the president has in mind to do, and that is to make our government more effective and more efficient,’ Clyde said.
‘They’re simply bringing the fraud, waste and abuse to light. And, then the rest of us, you know, the president and the executive need to take action on it. And then Congress needs to look at that and say, hey, we need to codify that into law to make sure that it stays beyond just this presidency.’
His legislation has more than 20 House GOP co-sponsors and a companion bill in the Senate led by Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah.
Clyde told Fox News Digital that he intends to raise his bill with members of the Trump administration, which has also driven significant pushback against the Impoundment Control Act.
Russell Vought, Trump’s recently confirmed director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), has previously called the Impoundment Control Act unconstitutional.
Trump himself has made similar arguments.
‘Since the Empowered Control Act of ‘74, we have seen a tremendous increase in spending. And I think that’s part of the problem right there. The president is required now by law to spend the exact amount that Congress authorizes or appropriates for a specific program,’ Clyde said.
‘Well, as a small business owner, I understand the rules of business. And I think that if you can accomplish the same goal and be more financially efficient, I think you should be allowed to do that. And I think the president has always had the authority to do that under the Constitution.’
Trump has already exercised significant control over existing federal spending commitments. He paused most foreign aid funding soon after taking office last month, as well as other funding streams his administration said necessitated review.
Parts of Trump’s federal funding freezes have been challenged in court, with a federal judge ordering the White House just this week to comply with an earlier legal order directing them to reinstate funding.
President Donald Trump’s team of zealous cost-cutters under Elon Musk will soon set their sights on the U.S.’s largest discretionary budget.
With an annual budget of $850 billion, the Pentagon has long been plagued by accusations of waste and inefficiency in its defense programs and recently failed its seventh straight audit.
‘We’re going to find billions, hundreds of millions of dollars of fraud and abuse,’ Trump predicted in an interview with Fox News’ Bret Baier on Sunday.
Congress appropriates the Department of Defense (DOD) budget each year in great detail, and urging lawmakers to trim costs may be where Republicans publicly break with Musk and his burn-it-all-down style.
Here is a look at where the Department of Government Efficiency team could set their sights.
Personnel and contracting
The inclination of Musk and his team seems to be to cull federal employees, but cost-cutting advocates argue that outsourcing work to contractors could have the opposite effect.
Typically, around half the Pentagon’s budget goes to contractors, corporations that have a profit motive unlike the government itself. The government relies on contractors for software support, training, weapons and to act as paramilitary forces in foreign missions.
‘A major driver of Pentagon waste is actually service contracting for what are really core government functions and administrative capacities, like simple things [such] as IT support,’ said Julia Gledhill, a researcher at the Stimson Center’s National Security Reform program.
‘It might run contrary to their larger project based on efforts to cut the civilian workforce, but there are a lot of areas to cut Pentagon waste by actually building up government capacity to do basic administrative functions rather than outsourcing them at a very high cost.’
In 2015, the Defense Business Board, at the request of DOD leaders, found that the Pentagon could save $125 billion over five years by renegotiating service contracts, streamlining the bureaucracy through attrition and early retirements, and consolidating IT processes.
The report found the Pentagon was paying an eye-watering 1,014,000 contractors to fill back-office jobs far away from the front lines. The DOD currently only lists around 1.3 million active duty troops.
However, the plan was never widely implemented, and Pentagon leaders took steps to ‘bury’ it for fear of budget cuts, according to a Washington Post report.
In October 2024, a two-year audit by the Defense Department Inspector General found Boeing overcharged the Air Force by 8,000% for soap dispensers that the service branch paid $149,072 over market price for. Of a selected 46 spare parts that were scrutinized by the audit, the report found the Air Force overpaid about $1 million for 12 of them for its C-17 transport planes.
That followed a 2018 congressional inquiry that revealed the Air Force was spending $1,300 for each reheatable coffee cup on its KC-10 aircraft – and then replacing them instead of repairing them when their handles broke. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, found the Air Force spent $32,000 replacing 25 cups.
Weapons programs: F-35s and land-based ICBMs
Musk has suggested that he will look to eliminate the F-35 stealth fighter jet program, long dogged by cost overruns, glitches and delays. In posts on X, he called it the ‘the worst military value for money in history,’ and the jet itself ‘an expensive & complex jack of all trades, master of none’ and added that ‘manned fighter jets are obsolete in the age of drones anyway.’
However, doing away with the F-35 has run into opposition in Congress every time it has been suggested.
A recent report put out by Taxpayers for Common Sense, Quincy Institute and Stimson called for retiring the F-35 jets and eliminating a ballistic missile program.
Halting the F-35 fighter jet program, dogged by cost overruns, glitches and delays, as some have advocated for, would trim $12 billion per year, according to the joint report.
But Congress would need to get on board with defunding the F-35 in its yearly defense bill, and Lockheed Martin produces the plane’s parts in many states across the country, where lawmakers have constituents with jobs at risk.
‘Defunding weapons that are overpriced, underperforming, and out of step with current missions, like the F-35 combat aircraft and the Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile, would allow us to invest more in real priorities while also tackling the nation’s tremendous debt,’ said Gabe Murphy of Taxpayers for Common Sense.
‘The ICBM no longer necessarily the most accurate, you know, weapon we have in our nuclear arsenal,’ added Gledhill.
‘We have our sea and air legs of the nuclear triad that are just as accurate and, you know, not as vulnerable as our ICBMs are because, you know, ICBMs are in the ground, we know where they are. It’s public knowledge.’
The report found that eliminating the Sentinel ICBM program would save $3.7 billion per year.
Base realignment
The Stimson report found that ‘targeted closures and realignments’ of U.S. military bases could save another $3-5 billion per year.
‘Even if say I accept all the missions we have now in the world, you could probably cut some overseas bases without even really rethinking strategy,’ said Ben Friedman, policy director at Defense Priorities.
‘If you accept that we’re trying to manage the Middle East through US military troop presence or at least the ability to deploy troops and say, okay, we could do with fewer bases.’
The Trump team is reportedly considering shutting down its presence in Syria, where 2,000 troops are currently stationed.
In the 1980s, under President Ronald Reagan, the government took up an effort known as Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC), a post-Cold War process to coordinate the end of force postures that are no longer needed. Five rounds of BRAC shut down 350 installations at a savings of $12 billion, but the last BRAC process ended in 2011.
Defense research
Some of the Pentagon’s $143.2 billion budget for research may also come under scrutiny.
Lawmakers last year demanded to know how an AI researcher in China acquired $30 million in U.S. grants. In 2021, Song-Chun Zhu was the lead investigator on two projects totaling $1.2 million from DOD grants seeking to develop ‘high-level robot autonomy’ that is ‘important for DoD tasks,’ and ‘cognitive robot platforms’ for ‘intelligence and surveillance systems.’
Additionally, the Defense Department inspector general found last summer that $46.7 million in defense funds from 2014 to 2023 had gone to EcoHealth Alliance, the nonprofit that funded gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a lab many suspect was the origin of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Use-it-or-lose-it spending
Under a use-it-or-lose-it policy, in the last month of the fiscal year, federal agencies work to spend all that is left in their federal budgets, worried that Congress will appropriate them a smaller amount next year if not. The Pentagon is no exception.
In September 2024, the DOD spent more than it had in any other month since 2008, with a hefty taxpayer price tag for fine dining.
It spent $6.1 million on lobster tails, $16.6 million on rib-eye steaks, 6.4 million on salmon and $407,000 on Alaskan king crab, as highlighted in an X thread by Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa.
That same month, DOD spent $211.7 million on new furniture, including $36,000 on foot rests.
Political headwinds
Cost-cutting initiatives will face opposition from a Congress that has never been keen to take a scalpel to the nation’s defenses.
‘If history is any kind of precedent, I do think that this is where you’ll start to see at least a real sort of tension arise,’ said Diana Shaw, former State Department Inspector General. ‘There are a lot of vested interests, and not just economic.’
‘There are folks with philosophical interests in the entire defense infrastructure and the military. And so, this is an area that has been well protected historically. And so I do think this now will be an interesting test case to see whether there will be, even within the Republican Party now, some pushback to the sort of aggressive cutting and picking apart that we’ve seen happen at other agencies that have historically been sort of less favored by members of the Republican Party.’
JERUSALEM—The president of the Palestinian Authority (PA) apparently capitulated to the Trump administration by claiming to scrap its long-standing program known as ‘pay for slay,’ which provides payments to Palestinian terrorists and their families.
There are, however, conflicting reports about whether the PA ended the program or is trying to hoodwink the Trump administration.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Oren Marmorstein released a statement on X saying, ‘This is a new deception scheme by the Palestinian Authority, which intends to continue paying terrorists and their families through alternative payment channels.’
On Monday, the Palestinian News and Information Agency (WAFA) reported that Mahmoud Abbas ‘issued a decree law revoking the articles contained in the laws and regulations related to the system of paying financial allowances to the families of prisoners, martyrs, and the wounded, in the Prisoners’ Law and the regulations issued by the Council of Ministers and the Palestine Liberation Organizations.’
WAFA noted that, regarding Abbas’ decree, ‘powers of all protection and social welfare programs in Palestine have been transferred to the Palestinian Economic Empowerment Foundation.’ The Times of Israel reported that it had independently confirmed through sources that the revocation happened.
The pay for slay policy gained public attention when Taylor Force, a West Point graduate who served in Afghanistan and Iraq was savagely knifed to death by a Palestinian terrorist on March 8, 2016, while on a tour of Israel. President Donald Trump signed the Taylor Force Act into law in October 2018, after a vigorous campaign by Force’s parents, Robbi and Stuart Force.
‘Abbas’ announcement seems to be a ruse aimed at pulling the wool over President Trump’s eyes,’ Asher Fredman, a former Israeli government official who now is the executive director of the Misgav Institute for National Security, told Fox News Digital.
‘It appears that the terrorists and families of terrorists who received payments under the PA’s ‘pay for slay’ program will continue to receive the same payments, simply via a ‘foundation’ under the control of Abbas, rather than via a ministry under the control of Abbas.’
Fredman added, ‘It remains to be seen whether Abbas truly ends the pay for slay payments, as well as the virulent terror incitement and antisemitism in PA media, schools and summer camps.’
He said the PA announced that the payments to convicted terrorists are moving from the Ministry of Social Development to an independent Palestinian National Economic Empowerment Foundation. The head of the foundation’s board is the minister of social development. The foundation’s general director is also apparently an employee of the Ministry of Social Development, according to her LinkedIn profile. The linkage suggests that the foundation is closely tied to the PA.
Rabbi Abraham Cooper, the associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, told Fox News Digital, ‘We will rejoice when the PA stops financially rewarding Palestinian terrorists for murdering and injuring Israelis. Abbas’ statement makes no such commitment. Mr. Abbas, you either support and abet terrorism or oppose and help end it.’
The Times of Israel reported that PA officials informed the incoming Trump administration about its plan to pull the plug on the ‘pay to slay’ program.
The thinking behind the PA’s decision is to curry favor with the Trump administration and avoid the strained relations that existed during the first Trump presidency. After Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital city in 2017, Abbas boycotted the Trump administration.
The Times of Israel wrote that Monday’s ‘decree is Ramallah’s latest effort to improve ties with Washington and amounts to a major victory for Trump, who managed to secure a concession from the PA that repeated U.S. administrations had worked to bring about.’
The PA is based in Ramallah in the West Bank (known in Israel as the biblical region of Judea and Samaria).
Fox News Digital reported after a late 2023 deal involving the exchange of Palestinian terrorists imprisoned in Israel for the release of Israeli civilians held by Hamas in Gaza that the freed terrorists would receive monthly payments ranging from approximately $535 to $668 for Jerusalem residents.
Jason Brodsky, the policy director of United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), summed up a recent trend of foreign leaders caving to the Trump administration. ‘I think it speaks to the Trump effect. Foreign leaders fear crossing the president because he knows how to engage in coercive diplomacy, and it produces outcomes which advance U.S. interests like this. Iran and other countries are watching very carefully how the president pressures other governments, and this will shape their decision-making. Thus far, Tehran has been more risk-averse since President Trump has been in office,’ he told Fox News Digital.
Fox News Digital questions to the Palestinian Authority were not answered.
Vice President JD Vance said Tuesday that U.S. artificial intelligence (AI) systems must not become tainted with ‘ideological bias’ and cautioned against coordinating with ‘hostile foreign adversaries’ on AI capabilities.
Vance appeared Tuesday at the AI Action Summit in Paris, where world leaders, top tech executives and policymakers teamed up to hash out tech policy and its intersection with global security, economics and governance. The appearance marked his first foreign trip as vice president.
While the Trump administration has signaled it plans to take an approach that favors deregulation of AI, Vance’s appearance at the summit coincides with recent attempts from the European Union to enforce harsher regulations aimed at promoting greater safety.
Meanwhile, the U.S. and the UK abstained from signing an international document at the conference signed by 60 other countries that aims to prioritize ‘ensuring AI is open, inclusive, transparent, ethical, safe, secure and trustworthy.’ It was immediately unclear why both countries chose not to sign the document.
Here is what is known from Vance’s remarks about the Trump administration’s priorities for the future of AI. First, Vance called for AI systems developed in the U.S. to remain free of ‘ideological bias’ and vowed that the U.S. would ‘never restrict our citizens’ right to free speech.’
That is because Vance said he trusted Americans to create their own thoughts and opinions, absorb information and exchange those thoughts in the ‘open marketplace of ideas.’
‘We feel very strongly that AI must remain free from ideological bias and that American AI will not be co-opted into a tool for authoritarian censorship,’ Vance said Tuesday.
Vance also pushed for a ‘deregulatory flavor’ to emerge at the conference while cautioning against the pitfalls of ‘excessive regulation’ that could hamper a transformative industry. He also vowed that the U.S. would back pro-growth AI policies.
‘We believe that excessive regulation of the AI sector could kill a transformative industry just as it’s taking off, and we’ll make every effort to encourage pro-growth AI policies and I’d like to see that deregulatory flavor making its way into a lot of the conversations at this conference,’ he said.
Other world leaders who attended the AI Action Summit include French President Emmanuel Macron, Indian Prime Minister Shri Modi and Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Guoqing.
Vance also issued a warning to other foreign governments about ‘tightening the screws’ on U.S. tech companies with international footprints, claiming the Trump administration would not tolerate such limitations. He also cautioned against working with adversaries who have ‘weaponized A.I. software to rewrite history, surveil users and censor speech.’
Vance said Tuesday that the U.S. will block such efforts, and ensure that American AI and chip technology is protected from theft and misuse.
‘I would also remind our international friends here today that partnering with such regimes — it never pays off in the long term,’ Vance said.
While Vance said that the U.S. wants to partner with other nations on this front, Macron said Europe could take a ‘third way’ approach in AI innovation and not rely on either the U.S. or China. Macron also called for enhanced ‘international governance’ on AI policy.
‘We want a fair and open access to these innovations for the whole planet,’ Macron said.
Vance’s comments coincide with some recent actions from the Trump administration to advance AI in the U.S.
In January, Trump unveiled a new $500 billion AI infrastructure project called Stargate, a datacenter joint venture between investment holding company Softbank, and tech companies OpenAI and Oracle that Trump labeled the ‘largest AI infrastructure project in history.’
The project includes an initial investment of $100 billion that is slated to grow to $500 billion over Trump’s term in office, and will build ‘colossal’ data centers in the U.S. to power AI.
The Associated Press and Fox News’ Michael Dorgan contributed to this report.
A judge temporarily halted a directive by the Trump administration that imposed a cap on overhead costs that go to universities and other institutions that host federally funded research projects.
The directive, which went into effect Monday, sparked an outcry of criticism from research institutions that argued the new rule would have devastating consequences. It was immediately challenged in court by 22 Democratic state attorneys general, as well as by several leading research universities and related groups in a second lawsuit.
U.S. District Court Judge Angel Kelley subsequently ruled in favor of the 22 state attorneys general, granting their request for a temporary restraining order that prohibits agencies from taking any steps to implement, apply or enforce the new rule that imposed a cap on facilities and administrative costs that are part of federally funded research grants.
The rule capped overhead costs associated with National Institutes of Health (NIH) funded research grants at 15%.
When a grant is awarded to a scientist by the NIH, an additional percentage, on top of the allocated research funding, goes to the facility housing their work to cover these ‘indirect costs.’ According to an announcement about the new funding cap from the Trump administration, that percentage has historically been around 27% to 28% for each grant. But in some cases, negotiated rates can be even higher, such as at the University of Michigan where the negotiated rate for indirect costs is 56%.
The lawsuit from the attorneys general argued the move violated federal law governing the procedures federal agencies must follow when implementing new regulations. They also argued that the move usurped the will of Congress, which, in 2018, passed legislation prohibiting the NIH or the Health and Human Services Department from unilaterally making changes to current negotiated rates, or implementing a modified approach to the reimbursement of indirect costs.
Kelley’s temporary restraining order requires the Trump administration agencies that are impacted by the new rule to file reports within 24 hours to confirm the steps they are taking to comply with her order. Meanwhile, Kelley set an in-person hearing date on the matter for Feb. 21.
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for comment on the restraining order, but did not hear back at press time. However, after the directive went into effect on Monday, White House spokesperson Kush Desai told Fox News Digital, ‘Contrary to the hysteria, redirecting billions of allocated NIH spending away from administrative bloat means there will be more money and resources available for legitimate scientific research, not less.’
Earlier on Monday, U.S. District Judge John J. McConnell said the Trump administration had violated his order halting a federal aid funding freeze that sought to pause ‘all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all Federal financial assistance,’ to ensure federal disbursements aligned with the president’s executive actions.
McConnell ordered the government to ‘immediately restore frozen funding,’ noting that plaintiffs had provided adequate evidence to show the Trump administration ‘in some cases [has] continued to improperly freeze federal funds and refused to resume disbursement of appropriated federal funds,’ despite his ‘clear and unambiguous’ order lifting the freeze.
It’s only three weeks into a fragile ceasefire, and Israel and Hamas are eachratcheting up allegations that the other party has violated the deal.
So far, 16 out of 33 hostages scheduled for release in the current phase of the agreement have been freed by Hamas, and 656 Palestinian prisoners from a list of nearly 2,000 have been released by Israel. But the weekly exchanges may now be disrupted after Hamas accused Israel of violating the agreement and said it would postpone Saturday’s hostage release “until further notice.”
Israel has hit back, with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying late Tuesday that the Gaza ceasefire will end if Hamas does not release hostages as planned on Saturday.
“If Hamas does not return our hostages by Saturday noon – the ceasefire will end, and the IDF will return to intense fighting until Hamas is completely defeated,” Netanyahu said in a video statement.
US President Donald Trump, whose envoy helped mediate the agreement along with officials from Egypt and Qatar, has suggested dismissing the multi-staged approach of the deal altogether and giving Hamas an ultimatum to release all the hostages at once.
Here’s what each side is saying, and where the deal could go from here:
Hamas says Israel violated the deal
On Monday, Hamas threatened to postpone the next hostage release, accusing Israel of violating the ceasefire deal by targeting Palestinians with gunfire in various parts of Gaza, delaying the return of displaced people to the heavily bombarded north, and not allowing the agreed humanitarian aid to enter the enclave.
The militant group also accused Israel of delaying the entry of essential medicines and hospital supplies, as well as not allowing tents, prefabricated houses, fuel, or rubble-removing machines into Gaza.
On Tuesday, the Gaza health ministry said that 92 people in the enclave had been killed in Israeli military operations since the ceasefire came into effect.
Abu Obeida, a spokesman for Hamas’ armed wing, said in a social media post on Monday: “We affirm our commitment to the terms of the agreement as long as the occupation commits to them.”
In a later statement, Hamas added that there was still an opportunity for the release to go forward as planned, saying that Israel has sufficient time “to fulfill its obligations.”
Israel says delay is ‘complete violation’ of deal
Hamas’ postponement is a “complete violation of the ceasefire agreement and the deal to release the hostages,” Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said Monday.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a meeting with his political and security cabinet on Tuesday, where they expected next steps.
Katz said he instructed the military to “prepare at the highest level of alert for any possible scenario in Gaza.” The Israeli military also said it was raising the level of readiness in southern Israel and that it would reinforce the area to enhance its “readiness for various scenarios.”
Those announcements also come after Israeli forces opened fire on Sunday in the eastern areas of Gaza City, close to the Gaza border, killing three Palestinians, Palestinian authorities said. The incident happened close to the border fence near Nahal Oz, an Israeli kibbutz, or agricultural commune. Following that incident, Katz said: “Anyone who enters the buffer zone, their blood is on their own head – zero tolerance for anyone who threatens IDF (Israel Defense Forces) forces or the fence area and communities.”
What did Trump say?
President Trump has urged Israel to “let all hell break out” and cancel the ceasefire and hostages deal if Hamas does not return those still being held in Gaza by Saturday.
“As far as I’m concerned, if all of the hostages aren’t returned by Saturday at 12 o’clock – I think it’s an appropriate time – I would say, cancel it and all bets are off and let hell break out,” the president told reporters in the Oval Office on Monday,
Trump added that all hostages ought to be returned, not two or three “in drips and drabs,” which is the phased manner of releases outlined in the deal.
Pressed on what “all hell” might entail in Gaza, Trump said, “You’ll find out, and they’ll find out – Hamas will find out what I mean.”
Trump and his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff are part of the team that helped broker the ceasefire, which was finalized with cooperation between the Biden and Trump camps just before the new administration took office.
The US president went on to say that Palestinians would not have a right to return to Gaza under his plan to take US ownership of the enclave and rebuild it.
Trump also told reporters on Monday: “I think a lot of the hostages are dead.” At least 34 of the hostages are dead, according to Israel, though the true number is expected to be higher.
How likely is the ceasefire to hold?
In short, no one knows.
It took about a year of negotiations to reach the current deal. The first ceasefire, in November 2023, lasted about a week.
The current agreement is set up to progress in three distinct phases, the first of which is already halfway through.
As well as the release of 16 hostages so far, phase one has seen the entry of more humanitarian aid and the withdrawal of Israeli troops from parts of Gaza. The Israeli military has retained its presence along Gaza’s borders with Egypt and Israel.
Israel has to date released around a third of the nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners agreed for the exchange, some of them held without charge, and others facing life sentences.
Following Israel’s withdrawal from a key militarized zone dividing Gaza, Palestinians began returning to what’s left of their homes in theheavily bombarded north. The “overwhelming destruction of homes and communities in the north” has left people without viable shelter, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, which has said “the need for food, water, tents and shelter materials in that area remains critical.”
Meanwhile, negotiations for the second and third phases have barely started.
Netanyahu waited until last weekend – one week after a deadline for further ceasefire talks – to send his delegation to Qatar. Israeli media has speculated that he is simply running out the clock until phase one of the deal expires on March 1.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a key member of Netanyahu’s coalition, has threatened to quit the government if Israel doesn’t return to war after the first phase of the truce.
Plastic tubes meander from Rosella’s nose to a nearby oxygen tank that’s bigger than she is, as she flicks through a book of her drawings: a flower, a house, a chicken.
The 9-year-old needs non-stop medical attention for the bone condition she was born with that has left her ribs pushing dangerously on her lungs, one of which is not working as it should.
Rosella and her mother are refugees living in one of nine remote camps dotted along Thailand’s mountainous border with Myanmar.
About 100,000 people live in the camps, having fled decades of fighting between the Myanmar military and ethnic minority rebel groups. The situation at the border has worsened in recent years by the junta’s coup and ensuing civil war.
Mae La is the biggest camp and its US-funded hospital is the only source of health care for more than 37,000 people living there – mostly from the ethnic Karen minority.
When the Trump administration ordered a 90-day freeze on almost all international aid, halting the US’ entire global development network overnight, the camp hospital was forced to shut its doors, sending shock waves through the refugee community.
Video posted by refugees on social media showed patients at the center being lifted from their hospital beds and carried out in hammocks covered in blankets.
Rosella was moved to a nearby improvised health center, along with other patients with chronic conditions. But there are no longer any doctors to treat her.
Numerous aid workers in northern Thailand described widespread panic and confusion following the sudden suspension of aid, especially among those whose work provides life-saving services to some of the world’s most vulnerable and impoverished people on both sides of the border.
“We have never faced a problem like this before,” said Saw Bweh Say, secretary of the Karen Refugee Committee, which represents refugees in the Thai camps.
Anxiety over medicine and food
Refugees in the Thai border camps live a fragile and isolated existence.
They cannot legally work and need a permit to even leave the camp. The Thai government considers the camps temporary settlements, but some communities have been there for generations.
Basic services such as health care, education, sanitation, water and food are provided by international aid donors. In Mae La, and six other camps, those funds come almost entirely from the US – the world’s largest aid donor – through the International Rescue Committee.
Though the camp hospitals are more akin to field clinics, with tin roofs and intermittent power, they are the only source of health care for tens of thousands of people.
“If it’s an emergency, how can we face the situation? That burdens a lot of people here,” said Ni Ni, 62, who has heart failure and kidney disease.
For some, it’s already too late. In nearby Umpiem camp, an elderly lady with breathing problems died after she could not access supplemental oxygen due to the hospital closure, an IRC spokesperson said.
Obtained by CNN
An IRC spokesperson said they had to start shutting outpatient departments and other facilities in the camps following the stop-work order. Management of the medical facilities, equipment and water system has been transferred to Thai authorities and camp commanders, though the IRC continues to source medicine and fuel using non-US funds.
Teams of refugee medics, midwives and nurses are working round-the-clock helping to plug the gaps, while families scramble for alternative treatment for their loved ones.
“Karen families donated medicine and oxygen tanks, but that’s not enough,” said Pim Kerdsawang, an independent NGO worker in the border city of Mae Sot.
Compounding their concerns is the cost of food. Feeding more than 100,000 refugees across all nine camps for one month costs $1.3 million dollars, and the organization that provides the food and cooking fuel says it has only enough money to last for a month and a half.
Refugees use a food card system to buy items in the camp shops, which is paid for by The Border Consortium. The food and cooking fuel are funded by State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM), the group said.
“The main concern is not having the means to provide the refugees with food and cooking fuel. So far, there is no alternative to the US grant,” said Leon de Riedmatten, executive director ofThe Border Consortium.
The organization has started prioritizing the most vulnerable refugees who have no income of their own, Riedmatten said, as the aid freeze and continuous arrival of new refugees fleeing violence in Myanmar drains the funds.
Thai hospitals bear the brunt
When Tawatchai Yingtaweesak heard the camp hospitals had shut, his team raced to see how they could help.
Tawatchai is director of the Tha Song Yang hospital, about a 30-minute drive from sprawling Mae La.
With no doctors on duty in the camps, his hospital and several others have stepped in to treat refugees with serious and emergency conditions.
Tawatchai said suddenly closing the US-funded hospital was “dangerous” and, since the aid freeze, his facility has taken in between 20 and 30 refugee patients.
He is working with camp medics and helping to deliver oxygen, among other supplies, but says this can only be a temporary fix. His hospital serves about 100,000 people and while they can cope, he worries that this year’s rainy season will overwhelm them.
Typically starting around June, the monsoon is “high season for disease,” Tawatchai said, with a surge in mosquito-borne diseases and children with pneumonia.
Naw Mary, 32, was rushed to the maternity ward at Tha Song Yang on Sunday, suffering from high blood pressure. Far from her family and home at the camp, she was about to give birth to her first child.
“They said it was risky to deliver a child in the camp without a doctor and facilities so they referred me to this hospital,” Naw Mary said.
Nervous and excited to bring her baby into the world, Naw Mary also said she’s concerned about follow-up care for her newborn and herself.
“Why did they have to stop helping the refugees?” she asked.
‘Those who are really in need’
The pain created by the US aid freeze goes beyond the refugee camps.
They include cuts to vaccine, education and resettlement programs, domestic violence shelters, anti-human-trafficking initiatives, safe houses for dissidents, and help for displaced people.
For more than 30 years, the Mae Tao clinic near Mae Sot has been a lifeline for vulnerable and impoverished migrants from Myanmar. The clinic handles almost 500 patients a day, and 20% of its funding comes from the US.
Now that funding has been put on hold, the clinic has to reallocate part of its budget so their health care services are not impacted.
“This fund we only use for vulnerable people and those who are really in need,” said Saw Than Lwin, deputy director of organization and development at Mae Tao.
Nearby the clinic, aid workers with the Burma Children Medical Fund load boxes of supplies containing food, infant formula baby milk powder, medicine, and eye screening kits, into a van.
It’s headed across the Moei River, a border between Thailand and Myanmar, to help thousands of people just kilometers away displaced by Myanmar military airstrikes and ground attacks.
The needs in Myanmar are huge, aid workers say, where millions of people struggle with hunger, trauma and the constant threat of attacks.
“The places that we’re working in are the remotest areas in all of Burma, very hard to reach communities without other alternatives to medical assistance,” said Salai Za Uk Ling, founder of the Chin Human Rights Organization.
About 30% of CHRO’s funding comes from the USAID and the group, which provides medical and mental health care to tens of thousands of people in Myanmar’s northwest, has had to cut vital services and lay off staff in the past three weeks.
“Rural communities, people who are living in displaced situation, don’t know a whole lot about international politics, all they care about is their daily survival,” Za Uk said.
“How do we even begin to explain to them why this is happening?”
In Myanmar’s Kayah state, also known as Karenni, the aid suspension has meant teachers’ salaries cannot be paid, leaving kids without education, said Banya Khung Aung, founder and director of the Karenni Human Rights Group.
If they had more notice, groups like his could have sourced alternative funding, he said.
Waivers not being processed
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has claimed the US is continuing to provide lifesaving humanitarian aid. Rubio, now the acting administrator of USAID, reiterated last week that he had issued a blanket waiver for lifesaving programs.
“If it’s providing food or medicine or anything that is saving lives and is immediate and urgent, you’re not included in the freeze. I don’t know how much more clear we can be than that,” Rubio said, questioning the competency of organizations that haven’t applied for a waiver.
Even if funds are made available after the 90-day freeze, “who would then communicate to us or be knowledgeable enough to process what is left of the system?” asked Za Uk from CHRO.
“By time that any funding reaches us, unfortunately for those suffering from serious medical condition might be lost.”
In his January 20 executive order, President Donald Trump said the “US foreign aid industry” serves to “destabilize world peace” and is “in many cases antithetical to American values.”
But those affected in northern Thailand are some of the world’s most vulnerable people who rely on US aid to survive.
In Mae La camp, Rosella can’t stray far from her oxygen tank. She needs one tank every two days, her mother said.
Complicating their family’s situation is that Rebecca is five months pregnant. She used to get her ultrasounds and prenatal care at the hospital, but that has all stopped as well.
“I don’t know what to do. There are no doctors to go and see right now for this pregnancy,” she said.
“I’m worried for my daughter and this pregnancy, worried for everyone.”
A couple who bought a London mansion for £32,500,000 ($40,200,000)have been told by a court that they can hand the property back and recoup most of their costs after the house was found to have a huge moth infestation.
Situated on one of the quiet leafy streets just outside Notting Hill, Horbury Villa seemed like the perfect northwest London home. But behind its grand Victorian façade, a colony of moths living in the insulation wreaked havoc across the house, which contains a pool, spa, gym, cinema and wine room.
Iya Patarkatsishvili, the daughter of a Georgian billionaire, and her husband Yevhen Hunyak bought the house in May 2019 from William Woodward-Fisher, a surveyor and residential real estate developer, according to the judgment published Monday.
However, the couple said that once they moved in they found moths on their toothbrushes, towels and wine glasses. The insects also caused damage to their clothes, some of which were thrown away.
At one point, Hunyak said he would kill between 10 and 35 moths every day, while his family and cleaners did the same.
A judge has found in the couple’s favor, ruling that Woodward-Fisher made “fraudulent misrepresentations” and “concealed a serious clothes moth infestation of the insulation in the house” before the sale, according to a press summary of the judgment, published Monday.
Mr Justice Fancourt ruled that Woodward-Fisher had falsely answered three queries before selling the house, including by saying that he didn’t know of any vermin infestation or of any hidden defect in the property.
According to the judgment, Woodward-Fisher’s wife had noticed a problem with clothes moths (Tineola Bisselliella) in early 2018 after new insulation was installed as part of major building works. The help of extermination specialists was enlisted to deal with the problem. She then forwarded some of these emails about the infestation to her husband Woodward-Fisher, the judgment said.
Fancourt noted in his judgment that he didn’t think Woodward-Fisher was “consciously trying to deceive the Claimants. He simply wanted to sell the house and move on.”
As well as granting Patarkatsishvili and Hunyak most of their money back, minus an amount to take into account the period they lived there, Fancourt also awarded them “substantial damages” and all the costs they incurred trying to get rid of the moths.
The availability of CWENCH Hydration at 54 MacEwen-owned Esso , Shell , MacEwen and Quickie gas stations is a direct result of the recently announced distribution agreement between Cizzle Brands Corporation and Keurig Dr Pepper Canada subsidiary Van Houtte Coffee Services (‘VHCS’), which distributes to over 30,000 commercial sites across Canada. This agreement with VHCS has already yielded meaningful results in helping to commercialize CWENCH Hydration.
Cizzle Brands Corporation (Cboe Canada: CZZL) (OTC: CZZLF) (Frankfurt: 8YF) ( the ‘Company’ or ‘Cizzle Brands’) is pleased to announce that the Blue Raspberry and Rainbow ready-to-drink (‘RTD’) flavours of its flagship brand CWENCH Hydration are now being carried in 54 Esso , Shell , MacEwen , and Quickie gas stations in Ontario and Quebec that are owned and operated by MacEwen Petroleum .
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250211625004/en/
CWENCH Hydration ready-to-drink flavours seen in a fridge at a MacEwen-owned gas station. The availability of CWENCH Hydration at MacEwen is an example of one of the many benefits of Cizzle Brands’ relationship with Van Houtte Coffee Services. (Photo: Business Wire)
This chain placement of CWENCH Hydration products was secured by Van Houtte Coffee Services (‘VHCS’), which is a subsidiary of Keurig Canada Inc., doing business as Keurig Dr Pepper Canada. In a press release dated January 29, 2025 , Cizzle Brands announced its distribution agreement with VHCS, in which VHCS would distribute the Company’s product lines across Canada and take over distributorship for certain existing Cizzle Brands accounts in categories including sporting goods retailers and stadiums.
Cizzle Brands highlights the following aspects of the MacEwen placement, with respect to the foreseeable business value that can be generated through the Company’s relationship with VHCS:
Within just the first few weeks of distributing for Cizzle Brands, VHCS has already landed a full-chain placement with an operator of 54 retail locations in two provinces under major banners that include Esso and Shell;
This placement has also brought CWENCH Hydration into the gas/convenience channel, a retail category in which single-serving beverages are often purchased routinely by consumers;
VHCS services over 30,000 commercial sites in total, meaning that there is tremendous untapped potential for CWENCH Hydration and potentially other Cizzle Brands products to be placed within a portfolio of tens of thousands of points of sale/consumption across Canada; and
With established and highly efficient infrastructure for warehousing, distribution, and last-mile delivery, VHCS provides the ability to instantly scale CWENCH Hydration’s Canadian footprint in a way that preserves Cizzle Brands’ margins without the cost burden of creating or maintaining a logistics network.
Cizzle Brands Founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer, John Celenza commented, ‘Working with VHCS was a transformational step for Cizzle Brands, as it enables us to commercialize CWENCH Hydration at a mass scale in a short amount of time. Making the product available to consumers in convenient locations is a key part of driving brand adoption in the beverage category, and this partnership with VHCS gives us the ability to accelerate that availability at a scale that is not normally possible for newer brands on the market. More specifically, major beverage distributors such as Keurig Dr Pepper do not normally take on brands that have only recently launched. Following the market debut of CWENCH Hydration in May of 2024, we have steadily built grassroots-level demand, and we believe that VHCS will be an important catalyst for this natural next step in our growth journey. CWENCH Hydration has only been placed in a small percentage of VHCS’ accounts so far, and just a couple of weeks into the relationship, this truly is just the beginning.’
About Cizzle Brands Corporation
Cizzle Brands Corporation is elevating the game in health and wellness. Through extensive collaboration and testing with leading athletes and trainers across several elite sports, Cizzle Brands has launched two leading product lines in the sports nutrition category: (i) CWENCH Hydration, a better-for-you sports drink that is now carried in over 1,200 stores in Canada, the United States, and Europe; and (ii) Spoken Nutrition, a premium brand of athlete-grade nutraceuticals that carry the prestigious NSF Certified for Sport® qualification. All Cizzle Brands products are designed to help people achieve their best in both competitive sports and in living a healthy, vibrant, active lifestyle.
For more information about Cizzle Brands, please visit: https://www.cizzlebrands.com/
For more information about CWENCH, please visit: https://www.cwenchhydration.com
Notice Regarding Images and Links: This press release may contain images and/or links to outside web pages, which could play an important role in providing the full context of the news update being conveyed through this press release. Some news aggregation services may remove these images and/or links at their discretion. Therefore, readers are encouraged to access SEDAR+ or the News section of the Cizzle Brands Corporation website to view this press release containing all images and/or links as originally published.
On behalf of the Board of Directors of the Company,
Cizzle Brands Corporation
‘John Celenza’
John Celenza, Founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer
CAUTIONARY NOTE REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION
This news release contains ‘forward-looking information’ which may include, but is not limited to, information with respect to the activities, events or developments that the Company expects or anticipates will or may occur in the future, such as, but not limited to: new products of the Company and potential sales and distribution opportunities. Such forward-looking information is often, but not always, identified by the use of words and phrases such as ‘plans’, ‘expects’, ‘is expected’, ‘budget’, ‘scheduled’, ‘estimates’, ‘forecasts’, ‘intends’, ‘anticipates’, or ‘believes’ or variations (including negative variations) of such words and phrases, or state that certain actions, events or results ‘may’, ‘could’, ‘would’, ‘might’ or ‘will’ be taken, occur or be achieved. Various assumptions or factors are typically applied in drawing conclusions or making the forecasts or projections set out in forward-looking information. Those assumptions and factors are based on information currently available to the Company.
Forward looking information involves known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other risk factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking information. Such risks include risks related to increased competition and current global financial conditions, access and supply risks, reliance on key personnel, operational risks, regulatory risks, financing, capitalization and liquidity risks. Although the Company has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in forward-looking information, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. There can be no assurance that such information will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking information. The Company undertakes no obligation, except as otherwise required by law, to update these forward-looking statements if management’s beliefs, estimates or opinions, or other factors change.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250211625004/en/
For further information, please contact:
Setti Coscarella Head of Corporate Development investors@cizzlebrands.com 1-844-588-2088
. 