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Trump Rejects Latest Offer From Iran; Hints at Resumption of Attacks
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The reaction came via Trump’s interview with Israel Kan News. President Trump says, “I’ve studied everything—it’s not acceptable” ( Kan). New York Sun: President Trump is holding his cards close to the vest as he says new military attacks on Iran may be coming, remarks that a defiant Iran is calling a phony effort to disguise America’s crumbling military. As government offices and institutions at Tehran were placed on high alert over the weekend, Mr. Trump on Sunday said he would not comment on what U.S. forces may do next, but that Iran’s latest 14-point proposal is unacceptable. “I’ve studied it, I’ve studied everything – it’s not acceptable,” Mr. Trump told Israel’s Kan News. Late Saturday, the president announced on Truth Social that he “can’t imagine” that the latest proposal would be acceptable “in that they have not yet paid a big enough price for what they have done to Humanity and the World, over the last 47 years” of revolutionary rule ( New York Sun). Senator Lindsey Graham (R): It is clear to me that Iran is playing games through negotiations as their last offer to end the conflict was absurd. Again, I hope this conflict can end diplomatically, but it is now time to regain freedom of navigation and forcefully respond to Iran if they insist on terrorizing the world. Enough with this terrorist regime’s behavior ( Graham).
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President Trump Announces ‘Project Freedom’ to Guide Ships Through Strait of Hormuz
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The backlog of traffic in the region has become a humanitarian issue. The president announced “Project Freedom” on Truth Social Sunday afternoon: For the good of Iran, the Middle East, and the United States, we have told these Countries that we will guide their Ships safely out of these restricted Waterways, so that they can freely and ably get on with their business. Again, these are Ships from areas of the World that are not in any way involved with that which is currently taking place in the Middle East. I have told my Representatives to inform them that we will use best efforts to get their Ships and Crews safely out of the Strait. In all cases, they said they will not be returning until the area becomes safe for navigation, and everything else. This process, Project Freedom, will begin Monday morning, Middle East time ( Truth). It’s a bold move with risk exposure as well. David Strom at Hot Air: This is an interesting strategy. It will enable hundreds of ships to leave the area, presumably laden with their cargo, stabilizing the oil market for a time, without establishing full two-way traffic and normalization…. This is a really bold move, as it would entail, one would assume, US Naval vessels going into dangerous waters with a hostile enemy that has vowed to keep us out. With all the talk of mines, suicide dolphins, and presumably a significant supply of drones and perhaps ship-killer missiles, the risk he is assuming is high ( Hot Air).
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Iran Threatens to Attack ‘Unauthorized’ Ships in Strait
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This will be an interesting week. Jerusalem Post sums up the latest: US Navy ships reportedly crossed the Strait of Hormuz on Saturday afternoon as US-Iran ceasefire negotiations kicked off in Pakistan, though Iran denied the reports and threatened to attack any unauthorized ships in the strait. Axios, citing a US official, reported that several US Navy ships crossed the Strait of Hormuz. According to the report, the move was not coordinated with the Iranian Navy and was the first time US Navy ships made such a move since the start of the war. According to the Wall Street Journal, three US officials confirmed that two US Navy guided-missile destroyers passed through the strait without issue in what was described as a “freedom-of-navigation mission.” Minutes later, a senior Iranian military official denied the reported crossing of US vessels on Iranian government-owned state television. Iranian media additionally released a warning that any US Military ship will be attacked within 30 minutes if it attempts to cross the Strait. According to State TV, a US vessel in the strait turned back after receiving the warning ( Jerusalem Post).
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Immediate Objective Number One for the US: Opening the Strait
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Watch what happens with “Project Freedom.” The underlying reality that it highlights is that in order to continue to inflict serious economic pain on Iran, we need to successful movement for the rest of the world’s cargo on the Strait. Reuel Marc Gerecht: America’s primary objective, then, must be reopening the strait. Secretary of State Marco Rubio appears to understand Hormuz’s importance, saying: “Those are international waterways. They cannot normalize, nor can we tolerate them trying to normalize, a system in which the Iranians decide who gets to use an international waterway and how much you have to pay them to use it.” What Mr. Rubio may understand but left unstated is that this means that the U.S. is stuck in the Persian Gulf guaranteeing safe passage as long as the Iranian regime lasts. It also means we are on the hook to protect, at a minimum, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates from missile and drone attacks against energy and water infrastructure, which may come if the blockade begins to eviscerate the Iranian regime or Mr. Trump starts bombing Persia into darkness…. If the regime doesn’t crack, we could be in a long struggle that will require commitment, patience, and discipline across the U.S. government ( Wall Street Journal).
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Operation Economic Fury: Target One, Iran; Target Two, China
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Or: Stated slightly differently, they are really one operation with an immediate target in Iran and a secondary target in China. Zineb Riboua of the Hudson Institute looks at the deep ties between China and Iran: That architecture survived as long as it did for one reason: China built the infrastructure to sustain it, and Xi Jinping made that a deliberate strategic choice on three levels. First, Beijing built the financial plumbing, developing methods for shadow banking, obscuring the origins of Iranian crude, rotating ship identities, and layering payments through third-country intermediaries. Second, its teapot refinery sector absorbed most of Iran’s oil exports to China, conducting those transactions through the US financial system in dollar-denominated deals and providing the IRGC with the hard currency needed to fund missile, drone, and weapons transfers to regional proxies. Third, and most critically, Xi used Iran as a rehearsal space, refining evasion techniques he intended to deploy on a far greater scale if Washington’s pressure ever turned directly toward China’s core interests…. What appears to be a pressure campaign against the IRGC and another against Beijing’s financial architecture is, in fact, a single operation ( Riboua).
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Trump Orders Withdrawal of 5,000-Plus Troops From Germany, Signals More Cuts
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The shift has been a long time coming, Trump is just bold enough to follow through on it. As we went into the weekend, the administration signaled the withdrawal of some 5,000 troops. Then, in follow up to that: President Trump vowed over the weekend to pull “a lot” more American troops from Germany after an initial reduction of 5,000, as fallout from the Iran war reshapes power dynamics around the world and fuels political friction at home…. The Pentagon announced the move late last week amid a public feud between Mr. Trump and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz over U.S. strategy in the Iran conflict. The Pentagon said it would complete the reduction of 5,000 within six to 12 months. Mr. Trump said he is prepared to go much further. “We’re going to cut way down. And we’re cutting a lot further than 5,000,” the president told reporters Saturday in Florida ( Washington Times). We currently have over 36,000 troops in Germany ( New York Times).
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5th Circuit Blocks Mail-Order Delivery of Abortion Pills
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Watch for the case to be appealed to the Supreme Court. For the immediate: Innocent human lives will be saved. The pervasive mailing of the abortion drug is the dark and macabre “growth sector” of the abortion industry. Post Millennial: A federal appeals court on Friday blocked a 2023 Food and Drug Administration (FDA) policy that allowed the abortion pill mifepristone to be prescribed through telemedicine and delivered by mail. A three-judge panel on the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously ruled in favor of a Louisiana challenge to the Biden-era policy, finding that it violated the state’s sovereignty. “The regulation creates an effective way for an out-of-state prescriber to place the drug in the hands of Louisianans in defiance of Louisiana law,” the judges wrote. They found that the policy undermined state laws aimed at “protecting unborn human life” and has caused “irreparable harm.” The court’s decision applies nationwide and restores the previous FDA policy, which requires the pill to be distributed only through in-person clinics ( Post Millenial). Washington Times: Mifepristone was approved in 2000, and surveys have found that the majority of U.S. abortions now use pills. The in-person dispensing requirement was eliminated in 2023 when the Biden administration finalized rules ending it, and Louisiana’s lawsuit targeted those specific regulatory changes ( Washington Times).
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The Abortion Pill and the Surge in Abortions After Roe
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The overturning of Roe, it was hoped, would lead to fewer innocent human lives lost as a result of abortion. The abortion pill has changed that. Pro-life advocates are speaking up to the Trump administration. Wall Street Journal: … abortions are up in the years after the overturning of Roe, and the antiabortion lobby has a new locus for blame. “Trump is the problem. The president is the problem,” Marjorie Dannenfelser, the influential president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. The ubiquity of abortion pills during the second Trump administration has led antiabortion advocates to decry the president’s appointees, including Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Marty Makary, and promise cash and political firepower to politicians who oppose the drugs…. Now, Dannenfelser’s group is preparing to spend $160 million in the coming midterms and the 2028 presidential primary. The hurdle for candidates looking to tap in to that support: They must commit, Dannenfelser said, “to pro-life action at the national level.” Leaders in the antiabortion movement are quick to credit Trump for nominating the Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe, but their frustration has been building for months ( Wall Street Journal).
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Democrat Candidate for House in Pennsylvania Pushed Theory That Bondi Beach Massacre Was Executed by Zionists
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The antisemitism we see unleashed in Europe is on the move here as well. Chris Rabb is a 5-term state representative from northwest Philadelphia. He’s now running for Pennsylvania’s 3 rd congressional district ( Rabb). Jewish Insider: Pennsylvania state Rep. Chris Rabb — a Democrat seeking the House seat of retiring Rep. Dwight Evans (D-PA) — shared an Instagram post blaming the massacre of Jewish Australians at a Hanukkah celebration at Sydney’s Bondi Beach on “Zionists,” the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. In the aftermath of the attack, in which 14 were killed and 40 injured, Rabb’s account shared disinformation insinuating the slaughter was a false flag perpetrated by Israeli interests. “We all know the gunmen were likely Zionists themselves,” read the post, which used an emoji in the place of the word “gun.” Shortly after the attack, the alleged assailants were identified as a father and son whom authorities linked to an offshoot of the Islamic State. Rabb’s post further lamented that Ahmed al-Ahmed, a Muslim Syrian immigrant who intervened, had not received broader acknowledgment for his “hero” role of disarming one of the attackers ( Jewish Insider).
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How Is That Jew Hunting Is Prevalent Again in Major Metropolitans in the West?
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The immediate city of reference is London. But we could go through city after city in the West with similarly distressing anecdotes and trends. Trevor Phillips from Sky News in the U.K.: 30 years ago, I co-wrote a report entitled Antisemitism: A Very Light Sleeper, a phrase coined by the Irish writer, Connor Cruz O’Brien, who warned that it would be awakened again in decades to come. He was right. For example, I was stunned to learn just a few weeks ago that a survey of British university campuses found that one in five students would never want to share a home with a Jewish person…. There are people in this nation right now hunting Jews for no other reason than that they are Jews. Everything else is just a way of justifying their persecution. There’s a grim guessing game being played out in some Jewish households, I’m told. The family debates who among their Gentile friends would have protected them from persecution a century ago, and who would have turned their backs for fear of being ostracized themselves? The question being asked is, “Would they hide me?” To Jewish families, more than a thousand years of history is bleak evidence that they are right to fear that when the knock on the door comes, they will once again be on their own ( Sky News).
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