TV News LIES

Donald Trump has approved a sharp reduction in the size of two national monuments in Utah held sacred by many Native Americans, in the latest move to open US public land to corporate developers and the oil and gas industry.

The two monuments, Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante, will see a reduction of “close to a million and a half acres each”, Trump said during an executive order signing event on Monday, undoing protections established by former presidents.

“They took the land from the people quite honestly,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Monday. “We’re giving it back.”

The Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments in southern Utah have ancient cliff dwellings, petroglyphs and scenic canyons, as well as coal and uranium deposits that state officials want made available for development.

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An ICE officer has fatally shot a man in Maine during what authorities described as a routine removal operation, the state’s attorney general’s office confirmed on Monday afternoon. Here’s what we know so far:

The shooting occurred as federal agents were carrying out an “enforcement operation related to a final order of removal”, the office of the Maine attorney general said.

The man who was killed around 7.20am had reportedly “attempted to flee in a vehicle in the direction of the officer”, the agency said, prompting the use of deadly force.

Senator Angus King said he spoke with homeland security secretary Markwayne Mullin following the fatal shooting in Biddeford, Maine. King urged state and local officials to remain involved in the FBI-led investigation. He also raised concerns that ICE agents were not wearing body cameras.

The person who was killed during the altercation involving ICE is believed to be a 26-year-old man from Colombia, according to the Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coaliton and Presente! Maine. He has not been identified further.

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US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday vowed to "dismantle" the International Criminal Court and urged other countries to join the effort as the Trump administration significantly escalates its campaign against the global institution.

Rubio accused the ICC of "waging a war against our country, not with bullets or missiles," but with "the force of so-called international law."

The administration's ire against the ICC goes back to President Donald Trump's first term, when it targeted the ICC for seeking to investigate alleged war crimes committed by US forces in Afghanistan. The second Trump administration has imposed a slew of sanctions against ICC officials for their attempts to investigate the US and Israel.

However, the State Department-led, "whole-of-government campaign" to dismantle the ICC is a significant escalation, particularly as it seeks to pressure countries around the world to join and threatens potential cuts to US assistance for those who don't.

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Donald Trump may have landed the biggest deal of his life.

In a controversial settlement which avoided a politically unpalatable transfer of Treasury funds into Trump's hands, the president and his family gained immunity from tax audits that could have cost $100 million, according to the New York Times.

The release from tax liability, authored by acting attorney Todd Blanche, who has served as Trump's personal attorney, came a day after the Department of Justice agreed to create a $1.8 billion fund which would benefit Trump's allies.

After political blowback, including from Republicans, Blanche said that the fund won't move forward, but continues to litigate lawsuits questioning its legality. Today, a judge in one of the lawsuits extended an indefinite block on the fund. But Trump's tax deal stood.

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One in four Israelis now engages in harmful substance use as the psychological fallout from Israel’s genocide in Gaza and its expanding wars across the Middle East reshapes daily life, according to research cited by Haaretz.

The Israeli Centre for Addiction and Mental Health said substance misuse had risen sharply since October 2023, when Israel launched its war on Gaza following the Hamas-led attacks.

Before the coronavirus pandemic, the rate stood at one in 10 Israelis. It climbed to one in seven during the pandemic before reaching about 25 percent after October 2023.

The centre found that sedative use had increased by 2.5 times, while the consumption of opiates ahttps://www.middleeasteye.net/news/one-four-israelis-using-drugs-amid-gaza-genocide-and-regional-warsnd stimulants had almost doubled. Alcohol and cannabis use had also risen.

Among people suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, the rate of substance misuse now stands at 54.2 percent.

Prof Shauli Lev-Ran, the centre’s founder, told Haaretz that repeated crises had entrenched habits formed during periods of extreme pressure.

“The more stress there is, the more people use,” he said, warning that consumption often continues even after immediate stress levels fall.

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Iran’s IRGC is now also claiming that it has attacked US military bases in Kuwait.

Meanwhile, sirens are sounding for a second time today in Bahrain.

Iran’s IRGC also claims it has hit a US base at Sheikh Isa in Bahrain in the second phase of retaliatory operation. The Guardian could not immediately confirm this claim.

Centcom said it struck Iranian military air-defense systems, coastal ‌radar sites, missile and ​drone capabilities, and small boats using US ⁠fighter aircraft, ​naval vessels, one-way ​attack aerial ​drones, ​and ‌one-way attack ​sea drones in its latest wave of attacks.

The Strait of Hormuz is a vital maritime corridor for global trade,” CentcomCentcom says it has completed a new wave of offensive strikes against Iran, hitting dozens of targets at multiple locations with precision munitions.. “Iran does not control it.”

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said it had set fuel tanks and ammunition depots on fire at Prince Hassan airbase in Jordan by firing missiles and drones. The Guardian could immediately verify the IRGC’s claim.

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Martha Lillard, who contracted polio at age five and spent most of her life dependent on an iron lung machine that helped her breathe, died on 26 June in Oklahoma, according to an online obituary.

Lillard slept inside the metal cylinder device that enclosed her body while changing air pressure within forced air in and out of her lungs. Despite that, she attended grade school for two hours daily before completing the rest of her education through tutoring.

“They told her she wasn’t supposed to live past 20 years old,” Cindy McVey, Lillard’s younger sister, told the Associated Press on Friday. “She had the enthusiasm and the drive to continue living and make the best of her life.”

McVey said she believes the effects of a long-term case of Covid-19 contributed to her sister’s death. According to McVey, Lillard’s death certificate lists chronic pulmonary failure and post-polio syndrome as her causes of death.

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Ro Khanna accused the Israeli government and military of “lying” on Sunday about the US congressman’s detention by armed settlers and Israeli soldiers during a recent visit to the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Khanna – a California Democrat – had posted video evidence on social media of Israeli settlers and soldiers blocking the path of his convoy on Wednesday in the South Hebron hills, near the village of Zanuta, where Israelis have driven Palestinians from their homes in what Amnesty International calls a government-backed “ethnic cleansing campaign”.

During an interview with NBC News’ Meet the Press on Sunday, the California Democrat was asked about the Israeli military’s claim that its soldiers “quickly dispersed” the Israeli civilians and reopened the blocked road.

“The IDF is lying,” Khanna said, referring to the Israel Defense Forces. “What happened was unprecedented. They had violent settlers detain American citizens, including an American government official. You had these settlers brandishing M4 [rifles], kicking the tires of our van, laughing at us, mocking at us, videotaping us.

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