Politics

A Los Angeles city employee who was trapped in Gaza for weeks has been safely evacuated from the besieged territory, according to the mayor’s office.“Our office has been working to get him to safety and I have been in regular contact with his son. I am relieved to announce today that the employee is now safe in a neighboring country and out of the war zone,” Mayor Karen Bass said Thursday afternoon in a statement. The city employee is Simi Valley resident Sohail Biary, according to a person with knowledge of the situation who was not authorized to speak publicly. Hundreds of Palestinians with foreign passports have been allowed to leave Gaza since Wednesday after weeks of attention on their plight, according to the Associated Press. The isolated Palestinian territory has faced a worsening ...

Prosecutors won’t seek the death penalty against the man accused of orchestrating the killing of Tupac Shakur, they told a Las Vegas judge Thursday as Duane “Keffe D” Davis pleaded not guilty to murder.Davis, 60, a self-admitted shot caller of the Compton Southside Crips, appeared in court handcuffed and told the judge he understood the charge he faced. He then entered his plea on his third court appearance since his late September arrest in one of the nation’s most infamous celebrity murder cases.After Clark County Judge Tierra D. Jones asked prosecutors whether they would seek the death penalty against Davis in the 1996 slaying, a prosecutor said they were not planning to ask a review panel to consider such a move.Davis asked the judge to explain what she meant by the question. “Every f...

WASHINGTON —  Supreme Court justices on Wednesday sounded ready to rule that a T-shirt with the phrase “Trump Too Small” cannot be trademarked by a California attorney seeking the exclusive right to sell clothing with the slogan.Trump is not a party to the case of Vidal vs. Elster, but in the past he objected when businesses and others tried to make use of his name.In arguments Wednesday, Biden administration attorneys urged the court to deny the trademark for the disputed shirts, but their position was not related to the message, which is critical of the former president. Since 1946, Congress has barred the registering of a trademark that includes a name or image that identifies “a particular living individual,” administration attorneys said.When they adopted this provision, lawmakers wer...

JENIN, West Bank — Even amid the terrible destruction that has transformed parts of Jenin into pits of jumbled masonry, the bullet-pocked tower of the Palestinian government headquarters stands out — not for the relatively light damage it sustained but for who caused it. Whereas homes in this West Bank city have been demolished by Israeli troops, roads have been churned up by Israeli bulldozers and storefronts have been disfigured by Israeli gunfire, the offices of the Sultah, or Palestinian Authority, were attacked by Palestinians themselves during a noisy protest over Israel’s bombardment of Gaza. Disgusted with the authority’s inability to protect its own people or stand up to Israel, militants in the crowd aimed their bullets at the government compound after its security forces tried t...

Of all the wrong-headed responses to the current crisis in the Middle East, demanding that the only Palestinian American in Congress be censured for criticizing Israel is among the most cynical.Inevitably, the war between Israel and Hamas has unmasked deep rifts among Democrats — between outspoken supporters of Israel and its steps to crush Hamas, and those who call for a cease-fire in Gaza and an end to Israel’s trampling of Palestinian rights. Opinion Columnist Robin Abcarian But Republican efforts to expel or censure Democratic Michigan Rep. Rashida Tlaib for her outspoken pro-Palestinian views is nothing more than a cynical attempt to grab the spotlight and exploit Democratic divisions for political purposes.Yes, it’s true that Tlaib has used the word “g...

U.S. gymnastics legend Mary Lou Retton says she is “staying very positive” as she goes through the “long and slow process” of recovering from a rare form pneumonia that kept her in intensive care for more than two weeks.“I’m beyond blessed to have the opportunity to make this statement,” Retton posted Monday on Instagram. “I am overwhelmed with all the love and support from the world as I fight. I am forever grateful to you all.”It was the first time the public has heard directly from Retton since learning of her health scare earlier this month.On Oct. 10, McKenna Kelley, the second-oldest of Retton’s four adult daughters, announced on Instagram that her mother was in the ICU “fighting for her life” and “not able to breathe on her own.” Kelley also revealed at that time that her mother di...

General Motors reached a tentative agreement with the United Auto Workers to end a 6-week-old strike with similar terms to the deal signed earlier by Ford Motor Co., according to people familiar with the matter.The deal includes a 25% hourly pay raise plus cost-of-living allowances over the more-than-four-year contract, according to the person, who wasn’t authorized to speak publicly. GM’s tentative agreement has similar economic terms to Ford’s but it is unclear if there are differences in retiree benefits, which has been a sticking point, according to the person.The agreement still needs to be approved by GM’s union members.GM’s shares jumped 3.9% on the news before paring gains in pre-market trading. The were up 1.1% as of 9:29 a.m. Eastern time.The UAW expanded its walkout at GM on Sat...

Thousands of people waving the black, green, red and white Palestinian flag and chanting “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” gathered at Pershing Square on Saturday afternoon to protest Israel’s escalating air and ground war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.The event began with a series of speakers who decried the deaths of thousands of Palestinian civilians in Israeli bombing attacks since Oct. 7, when Hamas militants launched their bloody incursion into Israel, and called for an end to what they termed an Israeli occupation of the densely populated enclave on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea.The crowd then began marching slowly down the middle of 6th Street, attracting hundreds more people who had arrived to show their support by joining the event led by groups t...

A gunman opened fire at a bowling alley and bar in Lewiston, Maine, on Wednesday, killing 18 people in the deadliest mass shooting in state history. In a statement Friday, Gov. Janet Mills called the victims “our family, friends, colleagues and neighbors,” and said she knew some of the victims personally. One — Joshua Seal, whom Mills called a friend — had provided American Sign Language interpretation during the governor’s COVID-19 briefings. “It is often said that our state is ‘one big, small town’ because Maine is such a close-knit community,” Mills said. “Tonight, I ask Maine people to join me in reading their stories, learning who they were, celebrating them as beloved people and mourning them as irreplaceable.” Here’s what we know so far about the victims: Tricia Asselin, 53 Tricia A...