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Lebanese officials directly contradicted President Donald Trump's breezy suggestion that its leader would speak with Israeli leadership.The 79-year-old president announced on Truth Social that Lebanese President Joseph Aoun would speak Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying they were "trying to get a little breathing room between Israel and Lebanon. It has been a long time since the two leaders have spoken, like 34 years," but Lebanese officials told Reuters that would not happen anytime soon."Lebanon's President Joseph Aoun will NOT hold a call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the near future, three Lebanese officials told Reuters on Thursday, after U.S. President Donald Trump said leaders of both countries would speak," reported Reuters correspondent Hümeyra Pamuk.Two of the Lebanese officials said their embassy in Washington had notified the Trump administration before a call between Aoun and Secretary of State Marco Rubio that their president would speak to Netanyahu, according to Middle East Eye.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth once again used a Pentagon press conference to complain about the reporting on the Iran war that is trapped in a stalemate, claiming the straight reporting on Donald Trump's attack on Iran has been “garbage.”He then claimed he attended church last Sunday with his family and heard a sermon about the Pharisees that reminded him of the persecution of Jesus Christ –– then comparing them to the US press.After boasting about the US efforts in the Middle East, the terse Hegseth pivoted to what has become a regular feature of his press availabilities.“We urge this new [Iran] regime to choose wisely,” he stated before adding, “Speaking of choosing wisely, a note to the press, to the press corps. To the American media, I just can't help but notice the endless stream of garbage, the relentlessly negative coverage you cannot resist pedaling. Despite the historic and important success of this effort and the success of our troops, sometimes it's hard to figure out what side some of you are actually on. It's incredibly unpatriotic.”“This past Sunday, I was sitting in church with my family, and our minister preached from the book of Mark, the third chapter,” he claimed. “And in the passage, Jesus entered a synagogue and healed a man with a withered hand. The Pharisees came to watch, and as the scripture reads, they came to see whether he, Jesus, would heal him or he would heal him on the Sabbath so that they might accuse him.”“You see, the Pharisees, the so-called and self-appointed elites of their time, they were there to witness, to write everything down, to report,” he added. “But their hearts were hardened even though they witnessed a literal miracle. It didn't matter. They were only there to explain away the goodness in pursuit of their agenda. As the passage ends, the Pharisees went out and immediately held council against him how to destroy him.”“I sat there in church and I thought, our press are just like these Pharisees,” he stated. “Not all of you, not all of you, but the legacy Trump-hating press, your politically motivated animus for President Trump nearly completely blinds you from the brilliance of our American warriors … The hardened hearts of our press are calibrated only to impugn. I would ask you to open your eyes to the goodness, the historic success of our troops, the courage of this president, and this historic moment for a deal that could end the Iranian nuclear threat.” - YouTube youtu.be

President Donald Trump's administration may be preparing for further conflicts after the Pentagon received a briefing to boost weapons production, a political analyst has warned. Pentagon officials were privately briefed by the Trump administration last month, according to Heather Delaney Reese. Further investigation from the Wall Street Journal found that admin heads had also approached US manufacturers about playing a larger role in weapons production. The WSJ found that, "The Pentagon is interested in enlisting the companies to use their personnel and factory capacity to increase production of munitions and other equipment as the wars in Ukraine and Iran deplete stocks. Discussions started before the war in Iran, the people said."This lines up with Reese's claim that the Trump admin has a much bigger plan that could potentially begin once the Iran war is deemed to be over. Reese wrote in her Substack, "By late March, the Pentagon had signed framework agreements with defense contractors to put the military on what it called a 'wartime footing.' "And now it isn’t just pressuring defense contractors. It’s reaching beyond the defense industry entirely, asking the companies that build our cars to start building our bombs. That is not what a country does when a war is almost over. That is what a country does when it is preparing for something much bigger."The United States is deploying more than 10,000 additional troops to the Middle East before the end of April. Roughly 6,000 aboard the USS George H.W. Bush carrier group, and another 4,200 from the Boxer Amphibious Ready Group and the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit. "These reinforcements will join the approximately 50,000 U.S. personnel already operating in the region, bringing the total to roughly 60,000 American service members and giving U.S. Central Command three aircraft carriers in theater."Reese went on to suggest that Trump is contemplating further conflicts to continue his image as a wartime president. "Maybe he is manufacturing a global conflict so he can play wartime president, surround himself with generals, and demand the kind of loyalty and worship that only crisis can produce, like he saw in those old movies," Reese wrote. "Maybe he saw what war did for other leaders’ approval ratings and thought he could replicate it, only to find that it doesn’t work when you start the war yourself and the whole world knows it."Or maybe this was always the plan. The Heritage Foundation. The Project 2025 architects. The defense contractors who stood behind him at the White House. They didn’t build this infrastructure for a man who wanted peace. They built it for expansion. And Trump didn’t just go along with it. He reveled in it."

The Republican Party has a problem on its hands that is bigger than anything President Donald Trump is currently doing, a political analyst has claimed.David Pakman believes recent comments from Marjorie Taylor Greene and former GOP representatives, including Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, highlight the problem with current reps. Greene, a once-prominent ally of Trump and the MAGA movement, commented on the alleged cognitive decline of Trump in a recent interview.In a clip shared by News 4 Tucson, Greene said, "I really think that his [Trump's] mental capacity needs to be examined. His rhetoric has been shocking to many Americans and people around the world."A separate appearance on CNN earlier this week from Greene had the GOP ex-rep, who resigned from Georgia's 14th congressional district in 2026, criticize Trump for a Truth Social post.Trump, referencing Iran in a post to Truth Social on April 7, wrote, "...a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again." Greene reposted the comment, adding, "25th AMENDMENT!!!"The 25th Amendment provides a temporary transfer of the President's powers to the Vice President. This transfer can be made by the President or on the initiative of the Vice President, with the backing of a majority of the cabinet.Greene added, "I think we have to truly question the mental stability of any President who threatens to wipe out an entire civilization of people. That would include all the innocent people in that country who have nothing to do with the war."Especially after President Trump said this was about freeing the Iranian people from the Iranian regime. For him to call to wipe out an entire civilization of people, it's absolutely wrong."Pakman believes the change in rhetoric from one of "Trump's most ardent defenders" is a sign the GOP must be vocal about their opposition to the President.He said, "This is way bigger than Trump. It exposes the Republican Party as happy with a system in which they know better, but they don't say a word. They just allow it to continue festering and perpetuate itself. Every once in a while, somebody like Marjorie Taylor Greene, Adam Kinzinger, or Liz Cheney, breaks rank and they say the quiet part out loud."Whether it's about Trump's authoritarianism or the cognitive stuff, they are seen as the exception. Now, they may not be the majority of Republicans, but there are a lot of Republicans who believe the exact same thing because they see the exact same thing."

Trawler set off from Bangladesh and reportedly capsized due to heavy winds, rough seas and overcrowdingAbout 250 people are missing after a boat carrying Rohingya refugees and Bangladeshi nationals capsized in the Andaman Sea, according to the UN’s refugee and migration agencies.The agencies said the trawler carrying more than 250 men, women and children reportedly sank due to harsh weather and overcrowding. It had departed from Teknaf in southern Bangladesh and was bound for Malaysia. Continue reading...

Donald Trump has turned on Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, publicly denouncing her as "unacceptable" for defending Pope Leo XIV against the president's criticism of his unprovoked Iran war.According to Politico, Trump spoke directly with Italian daily Corriere della Sera to express his fury with Meloni's refusal to join his attack on the first American-born Pope who resides in Vatican City."I was shocked by her. I thought she was brave, but I was wrong," Trump said in the phone interview, delivering a stinging personal rebuke to an ally he had publicly praised just a year earlier.When confronted with Meloni's Monday statement calling Trump's criticism of Pope Leo "unacceptable," the president responded with characteristic vindictiveness:"It's her who's unacceptable, because she doesn't care if Iran has a nuclear weapon and would blow up Italy in two minutes if it had the chance."Trump's grievance extends beyond the Pope dispute. He complained that Meloni expected the United States to "do the work for her" by protecting Italy from nuclear threats and ensuring stable oil supplies — suggesting she should be grateful for American military protection rather than criticizing his policies.The deterioration of their relationship is striking. Trump noted the two hadn't spoken "in a long time," a stark contrast to just last year when Meloni visited Mar-a-Lago as Trump's guest. At that dinner, he called her "a fantastic woman" who had "really taken Europe by storm."The rupture exemplifies Trump's pattern of discarding allies the moment they show independence from his agenda — a warning sign for other world leaders considering whether solidarity with the American president is worth the political cost.

The New York Times editorial board had a message Tuesday on what it takes to defeat Trumpism — and authoritarianism — as midterms approach. The editors described how the landslide defeat of Viktor Orban by Peter Magyar in Hungary should inspire Americans hoping to see change in the United States amid President Donald Trump's tumultuous second administration. They outlined the different ways opposing candidates could identify vulnerabilities for Trump and his regime using Magyar as an example of how to defeat autocratic rule and apply "an American version of this strategy."By talking directly about Orban's 16 years in power and the stagnant living standards in Hungary, Magyar saw the opportunity to give voters a new promise: reliable medical care, a secure family life and retirement. He said that political connections shouldn't matter and used the frustrations people were feeling to lay out his plan. He campaigned in rural areas of the country, adopted an even harsher immigration policy and distanced himself from a Pride march and LGBTQ issues, and although the editorial board did not agree with all of his maneuvers, it did recommend other politicians look closely at the strategy. This is something a Trump opponent can do: highlight the corruption during Trump's leadership, including the Iran war, the use of pardons to excuse his allies, tax policies that have made life harder for working Americans and easier for the wealthy, and climbing gas prices."His populism is fake. It serves a small slice of wealthy, well-connected people at the expense of most Americans, and it leaves him and his party politically vulnerable to an opposition that can credibly use government as a force for good," according to the Editorial Board. Democrats can use this to their advantage. They need to develop an "ambitious agenda" and not just focus on criticism of Trump. "The second lesson may be harder for Democrats — and center-left parties in Europe — to absorb," the editors explained. "Mr. Magyar, who identifies as center right, won partly by avoiding the social progressivism that dominates elite left-leaning circles and alienates many voters. He ran as an economic progressive and a cultural moderate if not conservative."Magyar — whose last name means "Hungarian" — relied on symbolism, using the Hungarian flag and a variety of other messaging styles. "Mr. Magyar thoroughly defeated this far-right giant. The free world should take an honest look at how he did it," the editorial board added.

Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance just suffered a humiliating foreign policy defeat that exposes the severe limits of American influence abroad — and signals potential disaster for the GOP in the midterm elections.According to the Washington Post's Michael Birnbaum, Trump's decision to personally intervene in Hungary's election by dispatching Vance to campaign for strongman Viktor Orban not only failed catastrophically, but also damaged Republican credibility on the international stage.Orban had been a darling of the American right, preaching to conservatives at CPAC about seizing control of institutions. "Have your own media," Orban once declared, "it was the only way to combat the 'insanity of the progressive left.'" He aligned perfectly with Trump's worldview, opposing NATO aid to Ukraine and framing it as anti-war rather than pro-democracy.Trump returned the embrace enthusiastically by exempting Hungary from energy sanctions imposed on other European countries, and Vance personally campaigned for Orban, telling Hungarians they had a guaranteed friend in Washington if they reelected their prime minister.It wasn't enough. Orban was decisively defeated. A constitutional supermajority for the opposition will now rewrite election laws that Orban had previously reshaped to favor his own party — a stunning reversal of fortune for Trump's endorsed candidate.Vance attempted to minimize the damage, claiming "I'm sad that he lost. We will work very well, I'm sure, with the next prime minister of Hungary. It wasn't a bad trip at all because it's worth standing by people, even if you don't win every race."But Republicans are furious. Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE), who is retiring, blasted the intervention as a norm-breaking disaster that backfired spectacularly."President Trump and Vice President Vance broke the norms by going and campaigning for a candidate in another democracy," Bacon said. "It's not appropriate to do it, and then they failed. So it's like a double-dumb move, and it just undermines us."The strategic implications are dire. One Republican strategist with extensive European experience warned that Orban's ouster is "a harbinger" for what might come in the midterm elections this fall."If you don't define your campaign on an issue set that gets your base energized to turnout in huge numbers, it will be a problem," the strategist told the Post.