US to fast-track investments from Middle East before Trump trip: Report

United States President Donald Trump’s administration has reportedly discussed the possibility of expediting investments by the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar before his trip to the region next week.

The early-stage talks were reported first by Bloomberg News. Any such development would require the US government to reform the Committee for Foreign Investment in the US (CFIUS), an interagency organisation led by the US Department of the Treasury, and which also includes representatives from the Departments of Commerce, Defense, Homeland Security and State that review foreign real-estate investments to evaluate if any prose a national security risk.

While it is not clear what a reform would entail, the goal would be to fast-track investments from these countries, with whom Trump had fostered a close working relationship during his first term, and bring in billions of dollars into the US economy.

The president might announce more information about the status of the changes and what it entails during his visit, which begins May 13.

Investment surge

Five of the top 10 most active wealth funds come from these three countries. Three of those five funds are in the UAE. In March, UAE National Security Adviser Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed met the president and later committed $1.4 trillion in investments to the US over a 10-year period.

The commitment includes investments in sectors such as artificial intelligence, energy, and aluminium manufacturing, including the first new aluminium smelter in the US in 35 years. It also includes a $1.2bn mining partnership with Abu Dhabi-based ADQ, a sovereign wealth fund, and the New York City-based investment firm Orion Resource Partners to mine for “critical minerals” in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

The largest segment of the proposed investment is in artificial intelligence. An Abu Dhabi-based investment fund called MGX has promised to invest $100bn in a data centre and energy infrastructure to support AI development in the United States.

In January, in less than a week of Trump taking office, Saudi Arabia pledged to spend $600bn in the US over the next four years. Trump later said at the World Economic Forum in Davos in Switzerland, that he pushed the country to invest $1 trillion in the economy. Trump and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman have a close relationship, which the two developed during Trump’s first term in office.

Qatar already had a strong investment relationship with the US. In 2015, the Qatar Investment Authority pledged a $35bn investment and opened offices in New York and Washington to facilitate the investments. QIA later committed $45bn in 2019.

Some of QIA’s most notable investments include $200m in EatJust, an alternative meat and egg brand, and major real-estate investments in New York City, including a 10 percent stake in the Empire State Building.

Conflict of interest concerns

Despite no direct involvement of the Trump Organization — the private company housing the Trump family-owned brands, including Trump Hotels and Golf Resorts – Trump’s upcoming trip and the proposed fast-tracking of investments have raised concerns of conflict of interest.

A month after winning the US election, the Trump Organization announced it had leased its brand to two new real estate projects in Saudi Arabia.

The president’s company also has projects and developments in all three of the countries he is set to visit, and that might receive fast-track status for investments.

“This trip, where Trump will meet with foreign officials who have the ability to make decisions affecting his company and business partners, poses enormous conflicts of interest for Trump, whose company is engaged in significantly more foreign business than during his first term”, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington wrote in a note published on Thursday.

On April 30, the Trump Organization, whose real-estate development arm is led by his son Eric, announced a new luxury golf resort in Qatar. Unlike in the first Trump administration, the Trump Organization said in advance of Trump’s inauguration in January that it would not shy away from foreign property investments.

Prince Harry’s ‘shock over going too far’ with King bombshell as he ‘faces consequences’

It has been more than a week since Prince Harry’s bombshell interview with the BBC and royal expert Jennie Bond believes he may now have a shock realisation over his claims

Prince Harry might realise he went “too far” when discussing his father, the King’s, health in a bombshell interview, according to an expert.

It’s been a week since the Duke of Sussex lost a Court of Appeal challenge over his security arrangements while in the UK and then gave an emotional interview, which would have left royal eyes rolling behind palace doors. In it, he claimed his father the King doesn’t speak to him, said he could not see a world where he would bring his children to visit the UK and declared he felt he had been “stitched up”.

In one part of the chat with the BBC, which is particularly said to have raised eyebrows, is when he touched on the health of his father, who is still being treated for cancer. He said: “Life is precious. I don’t know how much longer my father has, he, he won’t speak to me because of this security stuff, but it would be nice to reconcile.”

Prince Harry sat down with the BBC in a shocking interview and said the King would not talk to him(Image: BBC)

But with emotions still seemingly running high amid Harry’s rift with his royal relatives, former BBC royal correspondent Jennie Bond believes Harry may now realise the consequences of what he said.

She told the Mirror: “I suspect that Harry said more than he had perhaps intended because he was consumed with anger that the court decision had gone against him. When the court ruling didn’t go his way, he was, in his own words ‘gutted and devastated’. And he was clearly seething with fury. And that is rarely the best time to air your thoughts.

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“I think he might now realise that he went too far in talking about his father’s health. That was a clear invasion of the privacy that Harry himself so covets. And he might also realise that he has, in my opinion, now lost the support of the vast majority of the British public.”

Harry has been pursuing a case through the UK courts after his level of security changed in 2020, when he and Meghan stepped down as working royals and moved to California to carve out a new life for themselves.

The Royal Family on the palace balcony today
King Charles with the rest of the Royal Family on the palace balcony during VE Day commemorations(Image: PA)

He failed in his appeal against the dismissal of his High Court claim against the Home Office, over the decision of the Executive Committee for the Protection of Royalty and Public Figures (Ravec) that he should receive a different degree of protection when in the UK.

And Jennie says she has a degree of sympathy for him as he’s left reeling following his court defeat. She added: “I do understand Harry‘s feeling that he has been singled out for special treatment. I get that it seems illogical that others, former Prime Ministers, for example, who have left public office, still get police protection.

“But, as the Palace has stated, the decision by the Ravec committee has been tested in court several times, and it has come up with the same conclusion on each occasion.

“Moreover, other members of his family – apart from the King, Queen and William and his family – do not get the level of protection that Harry appears to be demanding. And it’s not as if he has been told there will be no protection. It’s just that it will be assessed case by case.”

In the wake of the controversial interview, VE Day commemorations carried on in earnest for the rest of the Royal Family this week. To mark the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, the royals took part in a series of engagements, including a huge Buckingham Palace balcony appearance and a moving service at Westminster Abbey.

Jennie said: “Despite their disappointment – and anger – over Harry’s interview, the Royal Family did what they do best at the VE Day commemorations. They carried on regardless, with grace and dignity, rising above the furore over the rift.

“We saw a family which, without Harry, is very much in harmony, working together and with the three children beginning to learn the ropes of royal duties. Therein lies the continuity of monarchy, with or without the errant brother.”

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Children among several killed in Israel’s attacks on Gaza amid aid blockade

Seven people, including three children, have been killed in Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip amid a months-long Israeli blockade that has deepened the humanitarian crisis in the war-torn coastal enclave.

Palestinian news agency Wafa said Israeli warplanes bombed a tent in the Sabra neighbourhood of Gaza City on Saturday morning, killing five members of the Tlaib family.

“Three children, their mother and her husband were sleeping inside a tent and were bombed by an [Israeli] occupation aircraft,” family member Omar Abu al-Kass told the AFP news agency.

The strikes came “without warning and without having done anything wrong”, added Abu al-Kass, who said he was the children’s maternal grandfather.

In parallel, a drone attack on Gaza City’s Tuffah neighbourhood left one person dead.

Further south, Wafa said Israeli gunboats opened “heavy fire” on the shores of Rafah, killing a man identified as Mohammed Saeed al-Bardawil. Two more civilians were injured in an attack on the al-Mawasi humanitarian zone, west of Rafah.

In the past 24 hours, at least 23 Palestinians have been killed and 124 others injured in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip, according to the enclave’s Health Ministry.

Israeli blockade

The attacks came amid Israel’s continuing refusal to allow vital supplies into Gaza since March 2, leaving the enclave’s 2.3 million residents dependent on a dwindling number of charity kitchens, which have been shutting down in recent days as food runs out.

Reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary said: “There’s barely food … We’re talking about bakeries not operating, we’re talking about zero distribution points and we’re talking about only a few hot meal kitchens still operating.”

Khoudary said people queueing for hours would often leave empty-handed, with remaining kitchens stretching out food that would previously have fed 100 to serve up to 2,000 people.

“We’re seeing more people dying, we’re seeing more children dying due to malnutrition and the lack of food. But it’s not only the lack of food, it’s also the lack of medical supplies, it’s the lack of fuel, cooking gas and it’s the lack of everything,” she said.

Among the charities shuttering operations, the United States-based World Central Kitchen said on Wednesday that it had been forced to close down because it no longer had supplies to bake bread or cook meals.

The United Nations’ Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs appealed for the blockade to be lifted.

“Children are starving, and dying. Community kitchens are shutting down. Clean water is running out,” it said on Friday in a post on X.

‘Failure of humanity’

The blockade is also having a devastating effect on people with chronic illnesses, depriving Palestinians who suffer from diabetes, cancer and rare conditions, of life-saving medication.

Reporting from Gaza City, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said: “Doctors here say the tragedy is not in what’s happening, but in what is preventable.”

“These diseases have a treatment, but people of Gaza no longer have access to them, and they say that this is not just a failure of logistics, but of humanity,” he added.

Mahmoud spoke to the father of a 10-year-old boy suffering from diabetes, who said insulin was not available across northern Gaza.

“I spend entire days searching pharmacies, hoping to find it. Sometimes we hear that individuals might have it, so I go to their homes to barter,” he said.

Said al-Soudy, head of emergency in the oncology department of Gaza City’s Al Helou International Hospital, told Al Jazeera: “A large part of patients are struggling to find their essential medications. Without them, their health conditions deteriorate and may become life-threatening.”

Pharmacist Rana Alsamak told Al Jazeera that Palestinians were unable to obtain medication for “multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, hepatitis, chronic illnesses and … immune-related diseases”.

“These conditions now go largely untreated,” she said.

On Friday, the United States said it was establishing the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation to coordinate aid deliveries into Gaza, with Israel providing military security for operations. The United Nations rejected the move, saying it would weaponise aid, violate principles of neutrality and cause mass displacement.

Tom Parker’s widow Kelsey reveals how he’ll stay present in her life after welcoming new baby

Widow Kelsey Parker has vowed to keep the memory of the late Tom Parker alive since his death in 2022 despite being expecting a baby with her new man Will Lindsay

Kelsey Parker vows to keep Tom Parker’s legacy alive with charity football match(Image: Getty Images Europe)

Kelsey Parker, who is the widow of the late Tom Parker, has revealed that she is determined to keep his memory alive despite being pregnant for her new man, Will Lindsay. Tom, who was part of The Wanted, lost his battle in 2022 after being diagnosed with a brain tumour. Now, Kelsey is hosting the third charity football match in a bid to raise awareness and funds for research into brain tumours.

Kelsey went public with her pregnancy back in January but in a recent interview, she defiantly claimed that the arrival of her new baby will not overshadow the legacy of the late singer. The Mum’s The Word podcast host, 34, was married to Tom for four years and the couple share two children together. Two years on, Kelsey revealed that she had found love again with her tree surgeon beau Will.

Kelsey Parker with her new man Will Lindsay
Kelsey Parker with her new man Will Lindsay(Image: being_kelsey/instagram)

In an interview with The Standard, she said: “Me being with Will and having a child with Will would never take away the love that we have for Tom and the love that even Will has for Tom, because Will ultimately loves Tom’s kids.”

She added: “It’s about us as a family and Will’s a massive part of their life now.”

This will now be the third Tom Parker Celebrity Football match in his memory at Bromley F.C stadium in Kent.

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The annual event promises to be a family affair that will also include food stalls, raffles and live performances.

The celebrities that took part include Ryan and Scott Thomas, former TOWIE star Dan Osbourne and ex Love Island stars Finley Tapp and Ronnie Vint.

In addition, Coronation Street’s Alex Bain, EastEnders’ Jaden Ladega had also signed up to be part of this year’s charity match.

She told the publication: “For my kids [these annual football matches are] a day to remember their dad. “

Kelsey Parker with her two children she shares with the late Tom Parker who passed away in 2022
Kelsey Parker with her two children she shares with the late Tom Parker who passed away in 2022(Image: Jeff Spicer/Getty Images)

She added: “When you get diagnosed like Tom did, it rocked our whole world and our family to know how underfunded brain tumours are and just raising that awareness that we’re gonna do on Saturday will go such a long way.”

She continued: “Even talking about it now, people have no clue that brain tumours are the biggest killer for under 40s and children and we only get one per cent of national funding. “

“That’s it. That’s all that goes towards brain tumours so more needs to be done and I feel like Tom’s left me the legacy to continue for him because he did so much in his 18 months of getting sick that now it’s my time to go you know what? I’ll continue shining a light on it for him”, she said.

She went on to say: “It’s a [big responsibility] but I’m doing it all for him because what we went through as a family you just wo9uldn’t wish that on your worst enemy. So it’s all about just helping other people now.”

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‘True inspiration’ – Scotland great Ross to retire

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Scotland great Jane Ross will retire from football at the end of this season.

The 35-year-old Rangers striker is second highest on the all-time list of Scotland women goalscorers and fourth most capped player, netting 62 goals from 151 games since her debut in 2009.

Across 19 seasons, Ross has represented six clubs over three separate countries, winning multiple domestic honours with the likes of Glasgow City, Rangers and Manchester City.

“I’ve loved my career, I’ve loved what I’ve done and it’s been a dream come true to have achieved what I have,” the striker said.

Ross started her prolific career at club level with Glasgow City, scoring more than 100 goals and winning three league titles and three cups before spending two years at Vittsjo GIK in Sweden.

Then came a move to Manchester City, where she won the the Women’s Super League, FA Cup and League Cup before spells at West Ham and Manchester United.

The forward returned to Scotland in 2021, spending the past four years at Rangers, where she has won a league and four cups.

Ross could add to that haul before her imminent retirement, with Rangers involved in the SWPL title race and Scottish Cup final.

The striker’s hat-trick in last month’s semi-final win against Aberdeen set up a potential final career match at Hampden when Rangers face Ross’ former side Glasgow City on 25 May.

Of the 62 Scotland goals scored by Ross, her header against Albania will be remembered for securing the nation’s place at the 2019 Women’s World Cup.

Reflecting on her international career, she said: “It’s been such an incredible honour to play for Scotland and the memories I have throughout the years will be memories I treasure forever.

“The experiences I’ve had as a player have been so special, and I couldn’t have wished to have shared it with a better group of people.”

Scotland head coach Melissa Andreatta hailed Ross’ “fantastic career” and added: “What a legacy to leave behind. Jane has given so much to the game and the imprint that she leaves on the Scotland women’s national team is undeniable – a true inspiration.”

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10 batters retired out – UAE cleverly beat the rain

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In cricket you have never seen it all.

At the Asia qualifier for the 2026 Women’s T20 World Cup in Thailand, the United Arab Emirates were getting twitchy.

They had raced to 192-0 in 16 overs against Qatar but rain was looming in Bangkok.

With only one team progressing from the group, the UAE needed the win against the side ranked 32 places below them, at 52 in the world, to guarantee reaching the next stage.

In a Test a side could declare to save time but in T20s declarations are not allowed.

So instead the two UAE openers – with captain Esha Oza on 113 and left-hander Theertha Satish 74 – retired out and the rest of the batting line-up each came to the crease and did the same under the instruction of coach Ahmed Raza.

It resulted in the remarkable scorecard of UAE being 192 all out in 16 overs – 10 batters retired out and no Qatar bowler taking a wicket.

And afterwards UAE dismissed Qatar for 29 in 11.1 overs to complete a 163-run win.

“Whilst the innings was going on we started hearing thunder and slight drizzle started,” Raza said.

“I went to the umpires and checked whether we could declare but in white-ball cricket you can not declare.

“I then asked the match referee if I could retire my whole team out.”

The win means UAE progress to the Super 3 stage of the Asia qualifier, meaning they remain in the hunt for one of the two spots that would take them to the Global Qualifier.

From there four teams will qualify for the 2026 Women’s T20 World Cup in England.

“With the thunder and drizzle we just had to make sure the whole game was played because the weather has been around,” Raza said.

“At the start of our bowling innings it was already drizzling and we were scared of the thunderstorm. There was not enough time. It was all done purely to get a result.

“By doing this I meant no disrespect to anyone involved, our opposition. Everything that happened was within the laws and was well communicated with the match referee.

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