‘ Oh, my dear. May God bless you! ‘ This Palestinian mother-of-four rekindles her relationship with her husband in northern Gaza. The family members endured displacement and Israeli bombing for more than a year before never realizing whether they would ever see each other again.
South Africa has refuted that it is “confiscating” land unfairly, an accusation that United States President Donald Trump made, adding he plans to cut all funding for the country.
Without giving specifics or supporting evidence, Trump accused the South African government of “confiscating land” and treating “certain classes of people” badly.
As part of his “America First” agenda, the US president had already slapped billions of dollars in global funding with a temporary freeze on almost all foreign aid.
In order to address racial disparities in ownership, the state of South Africa passed a law requiring the state to seize land.
Trump stated on Truth Social that he would stop providing South Africa with any additional funding until a thorough investigation into this situation was finished.
Later, in a briefing with journalists, he accused South Africa’s leadership, without providing evidence or details, of doing “some terrible things, horrible things”.
We reacted by trusting President Trump’s advisers to use the investigative period to gain a thorough understanding of South Africa’s policies within the framework of a constitutional democracy, according to South Africa’s Department of International Relations and Cooperation.
” It may become clear that our expropriation act is not exceptional, as many countries have similar legislation, “it added.
Cyril Ramaphosa, the president of South Africa, also refuted claims that the government is evicting land.
We anticipate discussing bilateral issues of interest with the Trump administration in relation to our land reform policy. We are certain that out of those engagements, we will share a better and common understanding over these matters, “Ramaphosa said in a statement.
A constitutional democracy with a strong foundation in the principles of justice and equality, South Africa.
No other significant funding is provided to South Africa by the US, according to President Ramaphosa, besides the US Aid program for AIDS relief, PEPFAR.
South Africa’s constitutional democracy is deeply rooted in the principles of equality, justice, and rule of law. There is no land confiscated by the South African government.
The recently passed Expropriation Act is a constitutionally mandated legal instrument rather than a confiscation tool…
Elon Musk, who was born in South Africa but is now closely allied to Trump, replied to Ramaphosa, writing, without providing evidence:” Why do you have openly racist ownership laws? “
A bill that would make it easier for the state to expropriate land in the public interest to address racial disparities in land ownership after apartheid in 1994 was signed into law by Ramaphosa last month.
According to the government, the bill does not allow it to expropriate property arbitrarily, the landowner must reach an agreement.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting with President Donald Trump and other members of his administration to discuss the Gaza ceasefire agreement and his Middle East plans.
Netanyahu was welcomed on a red carpet by senior Israeli officials and an honor guard carrying the US and Israeli flags at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland on Sunday.
So who is he meeting, what’s on the agenda, and why is this visit significant?
On Monday, the Israeli premier is scheduled to meet Steve Witkoff, Washington’s new point man for the Middle East. Witkoff has been widely credited for helping to broker the January 2015 ceasefire in Gaza, including from Qatari mediators.
A day later, a meeting has been scheduled at the White House in the afternoon, where Netanyahu and Trump will sit down together.
On Wednesday, Netanyahu is scheduled to meet with US military leaders at the Pentagon, followed by congressional hearings on Thursday.
His visit coincides with the upcoming ceasefire negotiations between Israel, Hamas, and other mediating countries.
The Israeli prime minister has stated on numerous occasions that he wants to return to fighting soon and that he intends to keep Israeli military rule over Syria and Lebanon.
Netanyahu is facing political pressure to make sure that his coalition can demonstrate regional military dominance, including by launching additional military assaults, after one of his far-right ministers leaves the cabinet.
Witkoff, the US envoy to the region, is expected to continue discussions with mediators Qatar and Egypt after talking with Netanyahu in Washington, DC.
Netanyahu is the first foreign dignitary to be invited to the White House on an official visit after two weeks of Trump’s inauguration.
Trump’s announced tariffs against Canada, Mexico, and China, which are scheduled to start imposing on Tuesday, come at a time when there is global concern.
The US president threatened tariffs on the European Union as the three US’s top trade partners announced their retaliatory measures. The 27-member bloc has been warned that if it is targeted, it will retaliate.
Netanyahu stated during his meetings that he would concentrate on the objectives Israel had set for the Gaza war before heading to the US.
The Israeli leader also stresses “dealing with the Iranian terror axis in all its components” in reference to the Tehran-led “axis of resistance” and the total victory over Hamas and the release of all captives in Gaza.
Hamas appears to have quickly relinquished control of Gaza, stressing that it will not release any more captives in the second phase if the Israeli side breaches its commitments by putting an end to its military occupation.
Netanyahu claimed that the Middle East’s history had already been altered by Israeli and US military actions during the conflict and that he intends to “redraw the map even further and for the better.”
Despite the destruction caused by the war and Trump’s plan to “clean out” Gaza by urging Egypt and Jordan to accept more than tens of thousands of Palestinians who have fled the region, he is also interested in stabilizing ties with the Arab countries in the region. Both Cairo and Amman have rejected Trump’s proposal.
During Trump’s first administration, the two leaders made a strong ally by moving the US embassy there and acknowledging Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. Trump also endorsed the Abraham Accords, which established normalized Israel’s relations with Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, and affirmed Israeli sovereignty over the occupied Golan Heights.
Unlike many of Trump’s other close allies, who hesitantly or rebuffed his unsupported election fraud claims, Netanyahu immediately congratulated him after winning.
After that, according to reports, Trump reportedly got angry with Netanyahu, and they didn’t communicate much.
However, despite Trump’s sporadic criticism of the handling of the Gaza war, their relationship gradually rekindled after Netanyahu’s return to power in Israel with a far-right government at the beginning of 2023.
Netanyahu cited the “strength of our personal friendship” and the fact that Trump first invited him to a visit following his inauguration as proof of our shared strength.
When US lawmakers broke records for the number of standing ovations they gave him during an address to Congress, Netanyahu was met with numerous protests when he last traveled to Washington, DC, last year.
This time, similar street demonstrations and online expressions of protest and condemnation are expected.
On the first day of his repeat term as president of the United States, Donald Trump went about , making good on his promises , to make life hell for asylum seekers. Proclaiming a “national emergency” to pave the way for the deportation of millions, Trump also immediately , cancelled the CBP One app , that previously allowed undocumented people to apply for legal entry to the US by land from Mexico.
The cancellation reportedly leaves some , 270, 000 , people from a wide array of nationalities stranded in Mexican territory, where many had been waiting almost a year in torturous limbo for CBP One appointments. This is only the start of the deadly odysseys refuge seekers have long been subjected to before applying for positions in the organization. They have frequently involved being followed by organized crime organizations and corrupt law enforcement officials as well as navigating the notorious and corpse-ridden Darien Gap between Panama and Colombia.
Predictably, Trump’s “deportation blitz” – as some outlets have dubbed it – has been a boon for the Mexican underworld and extortion-happy security personnel. A Venezuelan asylum seeker informed me that when I arrived a week after Trump’s inauguration in Ciudad Juarez in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua, the cost of being smuggled into the US had suddenly increased to $ 10,000 per person.
I arrived in Ciudad Juarez shortly after a fire at a migrant detention facility abutting the border fence that had killed 40 people. This was my first visit there since April 2023. Former US President Joe Biden, who, in contrast to Republican propaganda, deported more people than Trump did during his first term, had a reputable involvement with the , war on asylum seekers there.
As asylum seekers were acutely present in Ciudad Juarez in 2023, and many families set up camp in front of the immigration detention facility. Many people were forced to seek more substantial shelter due to the chilly temperatures and occasionally fierce, dust-laden winds this time.
The city’s local authorities had begun erecting massive white tents to temporarily accommodate incoming deportees because they were now facing an additional influx of people from the opposite side of the border.
I ran into a Mexican man in his 40s as I searched for asylum seekers in downtown Ciudad Juarez after being deported from Arizona after working at McDonald’s and Burger King and cleaning homes for extra income. He claimed to have been detained while out buying food and was later imprisoned in an underground cell while Arizona’s authorities deliberated on why he had no fingerprints, rejecting his claim that his evidence had been destroyed by house-cleaning agents.
After three months without seeing the light of day he was , released , and deported to Mexico, he said, with special glasses to protect against blinding by the sun. After that, he began working for one of the maquiladoras owned by the US in Ciudad Juarez, which has long allowed US corporations to exploit cheap labor just outside the border fence while avoiding paying taxes and violating the rights of its employees. Due to his employer’s never-ending demands, he had recently left his maquiladora job.
Indeed, Ciudad Juarez has come to epitomise the US-backed decimation of Mexico via so-called “free trade”. American author Charles Bowden uncovered a link between the impoverished and suffering of common Mexicans and the extractive nature of US-Mexico in his book Juarez: The Laboratory of Our Future, which was published four years after the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed. He described US machinations as “planting ruin about the world and calling it our economic policy” – which is as good an explanation , as any for the current “migration crisis”.
However, not only did the US “plant ruin” in Ciudad Juarez, it also backed an ostensible “war on drugs” that was launched in 2006 and saw an obscene quantity of Mexican soldiers and police deployed to the metropolis, which was quickly propelled to the position of world’s pre-eminent “Murder City”, the title of Bowden’s subsequent book published in 2010.
The narrative of never-ending wars between Mexican drug cartels serves as a convenient justification for the ongoing violence there, Bowden argued, while handily obscuring the significant involvement of state security forces in the drug trade and the lethal brutality that has plagued cities like Ciudad Juarez. Precise homicide statistics are impossible to come by, in part due to the all-too-common phenomenon of enforced disappearances, but , most estimates , put the city’s homicide total at well over 1, 000 for 2024.
A Mexican woman with grey hair and few teeth who had planted herself in the road in front of the border crossing and was distributing donations from US vehicles with Styrofoam cups was the next to speak with in Ciudad Juarez. She explained to me in Spanish that she had already paid her rent and that only $8 had been accumulated from yesterday.
After that, she switched to more sophisticated English and informed me that her 34-year-old daughter had been shot and stabbed to death in Ciudad Juarez and that she had also been deported from the US despite having a Green Card. The woman helpfully advised me to stay away from doorways as I could be grabbed and raped, and suggested that I might find some asylum seekers if I just walked west along the border fence.
As a US citizen and passport holder, I added $5 to the Styrofoam cup and headed west as directed. The towering fence serves as a constant reminder of my own exclusive, international freedom of movement. A young Guatemalan woman and her daughter were selling candy at an intersection when I discovered them. They had been in Ciudad Juarez for three months, the mother said, and had not yet come up with a different course of action as a result of CBP One’s cancellation. If I wanted better chances of finding “migrants”, she said, there were a couple of shelters down the road.
These shelters, which were essentially hidden behind the border wall, were not marked and consisted of tiny, abandoned structures that at least offered shelter from the blazing wind and dust. By striking up a conversation with a Venezuelan youth who had spent the previous seven months in Mexico and who had finally received a CBP One appointment date of January 28, or eight days after the program was overturned, I had gotten access to one Evangelical-run shelter.
Many Venezuelan families lived inside the shelter, many of whom were children who were barefoot and in shorts as I shivered in my winter coat and scarf. After the physical and psychological agony of the journey to Ciudad Juarez, a Venezuelan man in his 30s tried his best to keep things up, but he acknowledged that the entire CBP One situation was too much. He said, “It’s like swimming across a whole river just to drown on the other side. According to his account, cartel operatives and Mexican authorities had collaborated on four kidnapping plots in Mexico alone.
When the police arrived at the scene, I came across two Venezuelan men, 24 and 31, who were attempting to extort money from a convenience store before their windshield-washing tool broke and they had been arriving to engage in routine extortion. As we walked down Avenida Juarez toward the market and made an offer to buy him a replacement tool, the 24-year-old revealed that he had already been deported from the US twice, once from New York City.
He acknowledged that the American dream was not everything it seemed to be when he showed me a picture of him smiling atop the Brooklyn Bridge. “No one in the US wants to talk to you, they don’t want you to get near them,” he said.
The 31-year-old shared the view that perhaps the US was overrated and that living was not necessarily worthwhile if you were only interested in earning money. The two debated whether to relocate to Mexico City to make a living, or to settle down in Ciudad Juarez and remove the perpetual dust from their automobile windscreens. Or, of course, they could give it another go at crossing the border. But whichever way they ultimately turn, the “ruin” of US economic policy has already been planted.
Back in 1998, Bowden called Ciudad Juarez the “ground zero of the future”. And the future, unfortunately, is now.
Aid is pouring into the Gaza Strip two weeks after Hamas and Israel’s ceasefire was established.
The World Food Programme, the main UN food agency, reported that during the first four days of the ceasefire, Palestinians received more food than any other month of the conflict.
Since the ceasefire’s implementation, more than 32, 000 tonnes of aid have entered the area, entering through two crossings in the north and one in the south, according to the organization last week.
Bakeries have been opened, the agencies report, and high-energy biscuits handed out, while Gaza’s police have returned to the streets to help restore order.
But humanitarian groups say aid distribution is complicated by destroyed or damaged roads, Israeli inspections and the threat of unexploded bombs, which , litter the landscape.
Marcus Rashford, an England international, has joined Aston Villa on loan, according to both Premier League clubs, putting an end to a difficult few weeks for the England international after he was forced out of Old Trafford.
Rashford, who has been capped 60 times by England, will join Villa until the end of the 2024-25 season.
Aston Villa was a simple choice for me despite the fact that I had a few clubs approach. I really admire the way that Aston Villa have been playing this season, and the manager’s ambitions. Rashford announced on social media late on Sunday that she was just excited to start playing football.
“I want to thank Manchester United and Aston Villa for facilitating this loan agreement,” he continued. “I wish everyone at Manchester United the best of luck for the rest of the season.”
After entering the senior side in 2016 and playing in the youth system at Manchester United, Rashford has scored 138 goals in 426 games. He has won two League Cups, two FA Cups, and two League Cups.
The striker, who admitted he was ready for a new challenge in his career, had not played for United since mid-December.
Ruben Amorim, manager of United, questioned the forward’s work ethic and defended his team’s decision to add him after their defeat at Fulham last month. He said he would prefer to have a goalkeeper coach on the bench than a player who doesn’t give their all.
Rashford has also scored 17 goals for England. For his nation, he has represented his country at two World Cups and two European Championships.
In addition to signing Andres Garcia from Levante and Dutch striker Donyell Malen from Borussia Dortmund, Villa has signed both.