Gunman believed to have acted alone, says Pam Bondi
Authorities believe the suspect in last night’s fatal shooting of two Israeli embassy staffers acted alone, the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, has said.
She called the attack “horrific” and said security has been increased in many areas following the shooting.
Key events
CAIR condemns political violence and says DC shooting doesn’t reflect those who want US to end support for Israel’s war in Gaza
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the US’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, has condemned political violence as “completely unacceptable” after a deadly attack on Israeli embassy employees in Washington DC, and said that the crime does not reflect or represent the millions of Americans peacefully advocating for an end to US support for the Israeli government’s genocide in Gaza.
In a statement, CAIR said:
We condemn last night’s deadly attack on Israeli embassy employees in Washington DC.
While millions of Americans feel extreme frustration at the sight of the Israeli government slaughtering Palestinian men, women and children on a daily basis with weapons paid for with our taxpayer dollars, political violence is an unacceptable crime and is not the answer.
Such violence only undermines the pursuit of justice. Peaceful protest, civil disobedience and political engagement are the only appropriate and acceptable tools to advocate for policy change in our nation, including an end to US support for the Israeli government’s genocide in Gaza.
Yechiel Leiter, a hardline supporter of Israel’s war in Gaza and longtime backer of settlements in the West Bank, also told reporters:
Israel has a right to exist that goes back over 3,000 years, long before there was anything called Palestine as a geographic location. There was Israel, the people of Israel and the land of Israel.
We’ve come home, we plan to stay there, and we’re not going to be intimidated by the violence of those screaming on behalf of Palestine.
For the uninitiated, here’s more about Leiter from my colleague Andrew Roth:
The Israeli ambassador to the US, Yechiel Leiter, is speaking to reporters near the scene of the fatal shooting of two Israeli embassy staffers last night in Washington DC.
He says Donald Trump just spoke to Benjamin Netanyahu.
He repeats the claim that there has been a wave of violent antisemitism across US university campuses.
Leiter claims last night’s shooting was “done in the name of a political agenda to eradicate the state of Israel”.
He says it is part of a war “to demonise, delegitimize, eradicate the right of the state of Israel to exist”.
Trump’s tax bill to cost 830,000 jobs and drive up bills and pollution emissions, experts warn
Oliver Milman
A Republican push to dismantle clean energy incentives threatens to reverberate across the US by costing more than 830,000 jobs, raising energy bills for US households and threatening to unleash millions more tonnes of the planet-heating pollution that is causing the climate crisis, experts have warned.
A major tax bill moving through the Republican-held House of Representatives will, as currently written, demolish key components of climate legislation signed by Joe Biden that has spurred a record torrent of renewable energy and electric vehicle investment in the US.
Under the reconciliation bill, tax credits for cleaner cars will end this year, with incentives for wind, solar and even nuclear energy projects scaled down and then eliminated by 2032. Clean energy manufacturing tax credits will be axed by 2031, while Americans seeking to upgrade their homes to cleaner or more energy efficient appliances will get no further subsidy after the end of this year.
“This bill is worse than what people envisioned – it pulls the rug out from facilities banking on these incentives, it raises everyday household costs by hundreds of dollars and undercuts any sort of action on climate change,” said Robbie Orvis, senior director at Energy Innovation, a non-partisan climate policy thinktank.
“You can’t overstate how significant this will be in weakening the US’s position. With inflation, tariffs and rising electricity use, it really couldn’t come at a worse time. It’s a really damaging bill.”
South Africa’s Cyril Ramaphosa praised for keeping his cool in face of barrage by Trump
Facing a barrage of false claims from Donald Trump that white people were being persecuted in South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa remained composed, pushed back politely and even tried to joke with Trump, earning him praise back home, reports Reuters.
Ramaphosa may have drawn on his experience as the African National Congress’s lead negotiator in talks that led to the peaceful end of apartheid in 1994 during yesterday’s chaotic televised confrontation, in which he managed to avoid a Zelenskyy-level bust-up in the Oval Office. The ANC said of the South African president:
His conduct was in keeping with the proud diplomatic tradition of President Nelson Mandela.
Repeatedly interrupted by Trump, Ramaphosa calmly challenged claims that minority Afrikaners were the targets of a “white genocide”, the once fringe theory has been exponentially amplified by Trump and his South African-born ally Elon Musk.
The way he handled Trump’s onslaught was mostly drawing praise back home on Thursday. Author Pieter du Toit said:
President Ramaphosa did well to maintain a calm demeanour and he did well to stick to the facts as close as possible.
Political analyst Ralph Mathekga said Ramaphosa kept sight of the bigger picture and did not take the bait.
There was never a sense of arrogance on the side of Ramaphosa. He managed his emotions in a tactful way.
Ramaphosa’s extensive network was evident in the Oval Office, where he was accompanied by luxury goods billionaire Johann Rupert, South Africa’s richest man, and by champion golfers Ernie Els and Retief Goosen. “It was pragmatic of him to bring the golfers and Rupert, they are the sort of people Trump likes to speak with,” said Mathekga.
That pragmatism extended to inviting the three men and agriculture minister John Steenhuisen, all of whom are white, to address Trump, who listened to them without interrupting – in contrast to how he treated Ramaphosa.
At the start of the meeting, Ramaphosa complimented Trump on his changes to the Oval Office decor, offered him a 14-kg book on South African golf courses and joked about having worked on his own golf so he could take on Trump, who loves the sport.
Even after Trump began his attacks and played a video that falsely purported to show thousands of graves of white farmers in South Africa and flipped through printouts of news stories he claimed were of white people killed in the country, Ramaphosa tried to defuse tensions with humour.
With Trump raging at a reporter for asking about a luxury jet he has accepted as a gift from Qatar, Ramaphosa interjected: “I am sorry I don’t have a plane to give you.” Trump appeared unamused. “I wish you did,” he said, before resuming his attacks.
Judge allows Mahmoud Khalil to hold newborn son for the first time after Trump administration tried to block ‘contact visit’
Mahmoud Khalil, the detained Palestinian activist, was allowed to hold his one-month-old son for the first time after a federal judge blocked the Trump administration’s efforts to keep the father and infant separated by a plexiglass divider, reports the Associated Press.
The visit today came ahead of a scheduled immigration hearing for Khalil, a legal permanent resident and Columbia University graduate who has been held in a Louisiana jail since 8 March.
His request to attend his son’s 21 April birth was denied last month by Ice. The Trump administration then aimed to block Khalil from a “contact visit”, only permitting him to meet with his wife and son from behind a barrier. The government claimed that allowing the trio to meet in the same room could present a security risk.
After days of legal fighting, triggering claims by Khalil’s attorneys that he is being subject to political retaliation by the government, a federal judge in New Jersey, Michael Farbiarz, intervened last night, allowing the meeting to go forward on Thursday morning.
Farbiarz is currently considering Khalil’s petition for release as he appeals a Louisiana immigration judge’s ruling that he can be deported from the country.
Federal authorities have not accused Khalil of a crime, but have sought to deport him on the basis that his prominent role in protests against Israel’s war in Gaza may have “undermined US foreign policy interests”.
Khalil is scheduled to appear before that immigration judge, Jamee Comans, for a routine hearing later today. His attorneys said it was unclear whether the baby would be permitted to attend the hearing.
Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi, co-founder of the Mizrahi Family Charitable Fund and friend and colleague of Sarah Milgrim, one of the two Israeli embassy staffers shot dead last night in Washington DC, says she has a “broken heart” in a tribute she wrote to Milgram published in the Times of Israel.
Sarah was a young, passionate, and brilliant environmental advocate. She worked on climate and sustainability issues at the Embassy of Israel in Washington, DC, and was deeply committed to building a more peaceful and sustainable world.
Just eight days ago, I spoke with her about an upcoming climate initiative. She was full of energy and optimism. Recently, I attended an Earth Day event she co-organized, which featured Israeli environmental nonprofit leaders. Her leadership shone through – bright, compassionate, and determined.
She added that Milgrim “truly embodied the Jewish value of tikkun olam – repairing the world. Her loss is devastating not only to her family and friends but to the entire global environmental and Jewish communities.”
In a post on Truth Social, Donald Trump said that his “Big, Beautiful Bill … is arguably the most significant piece of Legislation that will ever be signed in the History of our Country!” after the bill’s passage in the House.
The president wrote that the bill “includes MASSIVE Tax CUTS, No Tax on Tips, No Tax on Overtime, Tax Deductions when you purchase an American Made Vehicle, along with strong Border Security measures, Pay Raises for our ICE and Border Patrol Agents, Funding for the Golden Dome.”
He added that the “Democrats have lost control of themselves, and are aimlessly wandering around, showing no confidence, grit, or determination”.
The American Osteopathic Association said it was “shocked and saddened” over the deaths of two Israeli embassy staff members. The suspect in the shooting, Elias Rodriguez, was an employee of the American Osteopathic Information Association, the statement said.
“We were shocked and saddened to learn that an AOIA employee has been arrested as a suspect in this horrific crime,” the statement reads. “Both the AOIA and AOA stand ready to cooperate with the investigation in any way we can. As a physician organization dedicated to protecting the health and sanctity of human life, we believe in the rights of all persons to live safely without fear of violence.”
Judge blocks Trump’s executive order to shut down the Department of Education
A federal judge has blocked Donald Trump’s executive order to shut down the Department of Education and ordered the agency to reinstate employees who were fired in mass layoffs.
US district judge Myong Joun in Boston granted a preliminary injunction stopping the Trump administration from carrying out two plans announced in March that sought to work toward Trump’s goal to dismantle the department.
The injunction was requested in a lawsuit filed by the Somerville and Easthampton school districts in Massachusetts and the American Federation of Teachers, along with other education groups.
The groups argued that the layoffs amounted to an illegal shutdown of the education department. They said it left the department unable to carry out responsibilities required by Congress, including supporting special education, distributing financial aid and enforcing civil rights laws.
FBI agents were present this morning at the Chicago apartment where Elias Rodriguez, the man whom authorities suspect of shooting and killing two Israeli Embassy workers, reportedly lived, the New York Times reported.
Agents blocked the sidewalk in front of the apartment building, and some were seen going in and out of the apartment, including two agents in full tactical gear. Bomb technicians were also reportedly present at the scene.
The Times reports that in the window of the apartment where Rodriguez lived were two signs related to Palestine. One sign read “Justice for Wadea,” a reference to the 6-year-old Palestinian American boy killed in Chicago two years ago. Another sign read “Tikkun Olam means free Palestine.” (Tikkun Olam is a Hebrew phrase that means “repairing the world.”)
