Gird your loins, it is DNC time: The Democratic Nationwide Conference begins as we speak in Chicago, and the Israel/Palestine-related tensions which were coursing by way of the left since October 7 might very effectively come to a head this week.
Tens of hundreds of protesters are anticipated to arrange proper exterior of safety to protest the occasion’s assist of Israel; presumptive nominee Kamala Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff, who’s Jewish, is expected to speak about Judaism on stage; and, similar to in the course of the Republican Nationwide Conference, some households of hostages taken by Hamas will plead onstage for the return of their family members.
Some delegates who eschewed voting for Kamala Harris, calling themselves the Uncommitteds, have damaged from the occasion choose exactly as a result of they don’t assist U.S. assist for Israel within the Gaza battle. The Uncommitted issue is particularly related to Michigan, a swing state with a big Center Jap inhabitants, and Democratic officers have been making an attempt to make inroads with the vocal disgruntled in current weeks; they need a DNC that alerts unity, and the chance that large protests might be happening simply exterior the gates undermines this.
“The important thing query for Democrats this week is whether or not the demonstrators characterize a significant group of voters who might swing the election in November, or if they’re outliers on the left who ought to be resisted in an attraction to the middle,” sums up The New York Occasions.
Hamas rejects newest ceasefire proposal: On Sunday, following days of tense negotiating and Secretary of State Antony Blinken shlepping to Israel believing an settlement was imminent, Hamas rejected a proposed ceasefire cope with Israel.
“After being briefed by the mediators about what occurred within the final spherical of talks in Doha, we as soon as once more got here to the conclusion that Netanyahu continues to be placing obstacles in the best way of reaching an settlement, and is setting new circumstances and calls for with the purpose of undermining the mediators’ efforts and prolonging the battle,” declared Hamas in an announcement, including that the U.S.-brokered ceasefire “aligns with” Israel’s calls for.
At concern is the truth that the ceasefire did not force full a Israeli withdrawal from the whole thing of the Gaza Strip. Israel had proposed sustaining a big safety presence on the border between Egypt and Gaza, in addition to sustaining management over the Netzarim Corridor, which divides the Gaza Strip’s north from its south.
Blinken has referred to as this round of negotiations a “decisive second” for Israel and Hamas. In the previous couple of weeks, Iran and its proxies, together with Hezbollah, have vowed to strike Israel in retaliation for its July assassinations of Hezbollah official Fuad Shukr in Beirut and Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran. To this point, wider battle has been staved off, however it’s unclear for the way for much longer that may final; the truth that negotiations had been in progress might have performed a contributing position. Now that will not be so.
Scenes from New York: One of many New York Metropolis hospital programs, Northwell Well being, is starting a studio to make its personal film and TV exhibits following the success of the Netflix present Lenox Hill, which adopted medical doctors and sufferers inside the system. However only a few years in the past, NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Middle needed to pay out a greater than $2 million settlement to federal regulators for failing to guard affected person privateness when a tv crew was filming contained in the hospital. Count on extra points, each moral and authorized, to come up.
QUICK HITS
- “The ports of Los Angeles and Lengthy Seashore, which account for roughly a 3rd of all US container imports, had their third-strongest month ever in July, simply shy of an all-time excessive reached in Could 2021. Again then, a wave of inbound consumer goods triggered provide bottlenecks on land and a queue of cargo ships ready for a berth offshore was getting longer by the day,” reports Bloomberg. “Demand now’s pushed by retailers and different importers which are stocking up forward of US tariffs on Chinese language items and a doable strike by a big group of American dockworkers—including to the standard frenzy of pre-holiday ordering that happens this time of yr.”
- Deliberate Parenthood Nice Rivers is providing free vasectomies and abortions for DNC attendees at a van close to the conference heart, which appears slightly self-defeating if the thought is to develop your political occasion.
- Additionally in DNC abortion information: Some protesters have dressed up as abortion capsules.
- Officers in Georgia “just like the prosperity that would include making [electric vehicles], however not the California-style mandates that prop them up. They like the roles however agree with a lot of their voters who suppose electrical automobiles are a sheet metal-clad tenet of the Democrats’ woke ideology,” reports Politico.
- Donald Trump’s working mate, J.D. Vance, responded this weekend to information of a Kamala Harris poll bump by saying the “media makes use of pretend polls.”