Minimums for a new Iran nuke deal, beware fake experts and other commentary
Even if Iran's leaders are 'willing to dispose of its stockpiles of highly enriched uranium, restrict itself to a purely civilian program and commit to never developing a bomb,' argue Bloomberg News' editors, they must also agree to see their advanced centrifuges (not needed for any civilian nuclear program) 'destroyed or removed from the country.' Unlike the flawed 2015 deal, new 'restrictions on enrichment will have to be indefinite or pushed out so far into the future that they might as well be.' Also, Tehran must agree 'to accept intrusive monitoring by American or European inspectors' as well as the International Atomic Energy Agency 'to demonstrate compliance.'
Conservative: Beware Fake Experts
'The propaganda campaigns against Israel rely on an industry of manufactured 'expertise,' ' explains Commentary's Seth Mandel — but the game is collapsing. A Sky News anchor recently denouncing 'Israel's strike on a tunnel system beneath a Gaza hospital to eliminate senior Hamas officials, notably its de facto leader Muhammad Sinwar,' cited 'our experts' in insisting 'Israel was wrong to say there were tunnels underneath the hospital' — but then 'Hamas confirmed that the targeted area was indeed the site of a tunnel system,' followed by 'reports that Muhammad Sinwar's body was indeed found in the tunnel system targeted by the IDF.' Fact is, news organizations now find 'experts' whenever 'they're needed to lend an academic gloss to rank speculation and conspiracy theories.'
From the right: Blacks' Bad Bet on Political Clout
Passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 prompted groups like the NAACP to fast-track 'efforts to elect more black officials,' believing 'that black political power would naturally lead to black upward mobility,' but the election of black mayors, congressmen and aldermen hasn't resulted in 'the broader economic and social uplift that many expected from increased black political clout,' grumbles City Journal's Jason L. Riley. 'Political integration' and 'influence' have 'proved insufficient' as history shows 'political clout' has 'never been a prerequisite for minority socioeconomic advancement.' Blacks needed 'more than political saviors and affirmative action schemes,' they needed 'economic growth and opportunity' plus 'the development of self-reliance, work skills, and cultural norms that have succeeded in lifting so many other groups.'
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Washington watch: Good Riddance to FBI HQ
'The closure of the J. Edgar Hoover building and the dispersal of the toxic Washington-centric [FBI] hierarchy is welcome news,' cheers Victor Davis Hanson at American Greatness. 'Most of the FBI scandals of the last decade were born in the Hoover building headquarters.' Special counsel Robert Mueller ran a '20-month, 40-million-dollar legal circus chasing the unicorn of 'Russian collusion.'' And FBI chief James Comey found 'Hillary Clinton likely guilty of, but somehow not indictable for, a number of felonies.' His successor, Christopher Wray, 'infamously oversaw FBI agents spying on parents at school board meetings' and the 'discredited Mar-a-Lago SWAT team raid.' And the agency suppressed 'any news considered problematic to the then-2020 Biden campaign' on social media. Let this closure ' also mark the end of the most sordid' chapter in the FBI's history.
Hate patrol: Medicine's Antisemitism Problem
Antisemitism is 'a problem among doctors, and a lot of that problem is concentrated among doctors educated overseas,' warn Jay P. Greene & Ian Kingsbury at Tablet. In a set of over 700 people 'profiled by the organization Stop Antisemitism,' Do Not Harm 'found that health professionals were more than 2.5 times more likely to be found among antisemites than their share of the workforce. Doctors were almost 26 times overrepresented,' and 'half of those Jew-hating doctors received their medical degrees abroad.' Among those, '68% were trained in the Middle East (40%) or Pakistan (28%).' 'This problem will only get worse as the rate of importing doctors from abroad is rising.' 'To be clear, the average foreign doctor is not an antisemite,' but 'in such large numbers, extremists among foreign doctors become more common.'
— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board
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Associated Press
23 minutes ago
- Associated Press
White House orders a review of exhibits at Smithsonian museums ahead of nation's 250th birthday
WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House is ordering a wide-ranging review of the Smithsonian museums and exhibitions ahead of the country's 250th birthday with a goal of aligning the institution's content with President Donald Trump's interpretation of American history. In a letter sent Tuesday to Smithsonian Institution Secretary Lonnie Bunch III, the White House laid out in detail the steps it expects the organization to take as part of the announced review. The examination will look at all public-facing content, such as social media, exhibition text and educational materials, to 'assess tone, historical framing, and alignment with American ideals,' according to the letter. 'This initiative aims to ensure alignment with the President's directive to celebrate American exceptionalism, remove divisive or partisan narratives, and restore confidence in our shared cultural institutions,' the letter said. The Smithsonian said it remained committed to 'scholarly excellence, rigorous research, and the accurate, factual presentation of history.' 'We are reviewing the letter with this commitment in mind and will continue to collaborate constructively with the White House, Congress, and our governing Board of Regents,' it said in a statement. The review, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, is the latest attempt by the president to bring the country's cultural institutions in line with his vision. In March, Trump signed an executive order titled 'Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,' which accused the Smithsonian of coming under the influence of a 'divisive, race-centered ideology' and called upon it to 'remove improper ideology' from the institution's museums. In February, Trump removed the Kennedy Center's Board of Trustees, replaced them with his supporters and named himself chairman. He vowed to end events featuring performers in drag, indicating he would take on a larger role in dictating the institution's programming schedule. The review of the Smithsonian will initially focus on eight museums — the National Museum of American History, the National Museum of Natural History, the National Museum of African American History and Culture, the National Museum of the American Indian, the National Air and Space Museum, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the National Portrait Gallery and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. The letter said additional museums would be reviewed in subsequent phases. Civil rights leaders have criticized the administration's particular focus on the National Museum of African American History and Culture as efforts to minimize Black Americans' contributions to the country and to recast the obstacles they faced throughout history. The Smithsonian has repeatedly denied allegations that it has changed or removed exhibit details in response to pressure from the administration. Recently, the institution removed references to Trump's two impeachments from an exhibit on the American presidency. A spokesman for the museum said the references, which were added in 2021, were intended to be a temporary measure and said a future exhibit would include details on all presidential impeachments. The review ordered by the White House directs the museums to submit materials from exhibits and drafts for upcoming events within 30 days. Within 120 days, the letter said, museums will be expected to take corrective action, 'replacing divisive or ideologically driven language with unifying, historically accurate, and constructive descriptions.'
New York Post
25 minutes ago
- New York Post
What to expect from Friday's Trump-Putin summit on US soil: Will a peace deal actually be reached?
WASHINGTON — President Trump's Friday meeting with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin may be the most-watched Washington-Moscow summit in decades — but don't expect any major decisions to be made as the US president seeks a 'more firm understanding' of how to end Moscow's war on Ukraine, sources and experts tell The Post. Trump, 79, plans to treat the meeting as a 'listening exercise' rather than a high-stakes negotiation, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Tuesday. While Putin, 72, has set audacious conditions for agreeing to a cease-fire with Ukraine, the US has made no concrete decision to date on whether to support them, sources familiar with the matter tell The Post. What Russia wants Among the demands reportedly pushed by Putin — almost entirely unchanged from the start of the war nearly three-and-a-half years ago — is the formal recognition by the US and Ukraine of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts as Russian territory, despite Moscow being unable to secure them in 11 years of trying. Advertisement 4 Russia's President Vladimir Putin and President Donald Trump attend a meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Osaka, Japan June 28, 2019. REUTERS This recognition would include the roughly 30% of Donetsk and Luhansk that Russia does not control. The Kremlin also seeks a freezing of the current front lines. Advertisement The desires were communicated to Trump by Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, who met with Putin at the Kremlin last week, according to European officials. However, Russia has not made these demands public, which is one reason why Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky would like a sitdown with Putin — to get the terms direct from the horse's mouth. Russia has also pushed for Ukraine to formally agree to never join NATO, a halt to shipments of Western weapons to Ukraine and a prohibition on NATO-aligned soldiers from setting foot on Ukrainian territory. 4 Putin and Trump last saw each other in 2019. AFP via Getty Images Advertisement Despite the White House insisting the war will be the primary topic, Russian officials have indicated they see the Alaska summit as a prime opportunity to discuss potential deals with the US — including opening up Alaskan airspace to Russian flights. 'We hope that the upcoming summit will give impetus to the normalization of bilateral relations,' Russia's deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov told state media site Izvestia, noting that restoration of air traffic could be a possible topic. The Arctic and economic cooperation are also topics that interest Russia, Putin adviser Yuri Ushakov said, noting that the Kremlin hopes the meeting will lead to Trump going to Russia in the future. However, Russia observers have expressed concerns over the Alaska location — particularly as Moscow's hardliners have long 'lamented the loss of Russia's larger territorial extent throughout history,' George Barros of the Institute for the Study of War said Tuesday. Advertisement 'Russian nationalists have manufactured a pseudo-historical argument for why America's purchase of Alaska [in 1867] was illegitimate, and that Alaska is therefore actually legally Russian,' he said. 'This is all nonsense, of course.' 'The Russian nationalist doesn't respect the United States, but rather invents territorial disputes with its neighbors and seethes at Russa's diminished geography.' What Ukraine wants Zelensky, 47, has called Moscow's demands untenable for establishing a cease-fire, but has signaled openness to some concessions — so long as they are made as part of a final peace deal. Ending the war after more than three grueling years would be a positive for Zelensky, as his country has been ravaged by missile strikes, mines and Russian infantry. But the Ukrainian leader has been clear he will not accept peace at any price. 4 In this photo taken from video released by Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Thursday, July 31, 2025, a Russian Giatsint-S self-propelled gun fires towards Ukrainian positions on an undisclosed location in Ukraine. AP Zelensky has been adamant that Ukraine receive security guarantees, like NATO membership or nuclear weapons, to ensure Russia doesn't invade again in the future. 'It is impossible to talk about Ukraine without Ukraine, and no one will recognize that. That's why this conversation may be important for their bilateral track, but they cannot decide anything on Ukraine without us,' Zelensky told reporters in Kyiv Tuesday. 'I hope the US president understands that and takes into account.' What Trump wants Advertisement Friday will give the president a chance to observe Putin with his own eyes to better assess whether the Russian dictator is 'tapping [him] along' with empty promises of peace, as Trump himself has occasionally suggested might be the case. 'Only one party that's involved in this war is going to be present, and so this is for the president to go in and to get, again, a more firm and better understanding of how we can hopefully bring this war to an end,' Leavitt said. 4 Various aircrafts are seen at Anchorage Ted Stevens International Airport in Anchorage, Alaska, United States on July 2, 2024. Anadolu via Getty Images Secretary of State Marco Rubio similarly described the summit as a 'feel-out meeting, to be honest.' Advertisement 'The president talked to Putin on the phone three or four times, OK? And nothing has come of it — or at least we haven't gotten to where we want to be,' he said. 'And so the president feels like, 'Look, I've got to look at this guy across the table. I need to see him face-to-face. I need to hear him one-on-one. I need to make an assessment by looking at him.'' Trump made ending the war in Ukraine one of his major 2024 campaign promises, and securing a peace deal would provide a major bulwark for his foreign policy legacy. To that end, Trump is expected to raise the issue of land swaps between Russia and Ukraine to gauge Putin's reaction. The US president will also speak to European leaders ahead of Friday's meeting in addition to after the sitdown, sources familiar with the preparations say. 'The next meeting will be with Zelensky and Putin, or Zelensky and Putin and me. I'll be there if they need, but I want a meeting set up between the two leaders,' Trump said Monday. 'There'll be some land swapping.'
The Hill
25 minutes ago
- The Hill
Trump administration calls out human rights records of some nations accepting deported migrants
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration on Tuesday released human rights reports for countries worldwide, which eliminate mentions of discrimination faced by LGBTQ people, reduce a previous focus on reproductive rights and criticize restrictions on political speech by U.S. allies in Europe that American officials believe target right-wing politicians. The reports, which cover 2024 before President Donald Trump took office, reflect his administration's focus on free speech and protecting the lives of the unborn. However, the reports also offer a glimpse into the administration's view of dire human rights conditions in some countries that have agreed to accept migrants deported from the United States under Trump's immigration crackdown. 'This year's reports were streamlined for better utility and accessibility in the field and by partners,' the State Department said. The congressionally mandated reports in the past have been frequently used for reference and cited by lawmakers, policymakers, academic researchers and others investigating potential asylum claims or looking into conditions in specific countries. The reports were delayed by the Trump administration's changes The reports had been due to be released in March. The State Department said in an overview that the delay occurred because the Trump administration decided in March to 'adjust' the reports, which had been compiled during the Biden administration. Among other deletions, the reports do not include accounts from individual abuse survivors or witnesses. 'Frequently, eyewitnesses are intimidated or prevented from reporting what they know,' the overview said. 'On the other hand, individuals and groups opposed to a government may have incentive to exaggerate or fabricate abuses. In similar fashion, some governments may distort or exaggerate abuses attributed to opposition groups.' Human rights groups decried the changes in focus and omissions of certain categories of discrimination and potential abuse. 'With the release of the U.S. State Department's human rights report, it is clear that the Trump Administration has engaged in a very selective documentation of human rights abuses in certain countries,' Amnesty International said in a statement. 'In addition to eliminating entire sections for certain countries – for example discrimination against LGBTQ+ people – there are also arbitrary omissions within existing sections of the report based on the country,' it said. The reports do follow previous practices in criticizing widespread human rights abuses in China, Iran, North Korea and Russia. Laying out the poor human rights records of countries accepting migrant deportees Although such deportations did not begin until after Trump took office, the reports, with one notable exception, detail general poor human rights conditions in many of the countries that have agreed to accept migrants, even if they are not citizens of that nation. The exception is El Salvador, which was the first of several countries in Latin America and Africa to agree to accept non-citizen migrant deportees from the U.S. Despite claims from rights advocates to the contrary, the report about the country says 'there were no credible reports of significant human rights abuses' in El Salvador in 2024 and that 'the government took credible steps to identify and punish officials who committed human rights abuses.' Human rights groups have accused authorities of abuses, including at a notorious prison where many migrants are sent. However, for Eswatini — a small country in Africa formerly known as Swaziland — South Sudan and Rwanda, the reports paint a grimmer picture. All have agreed to accept third-country deportees from the United States. In all three countries, the reports noted 'significant human rights issues included credible reports of arbitrary or unlawful killings, torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment … serious restrictions on freedom of expression and media freedom, prohibiting independent trade unions or significant or systematic restrictions on workers' freedom of association.' Those governments 'did not take credible steps or action to identify and punish officials who committed human rights abuses,' the reports said. Singling out the treatment of white South Africans South Africa was also singled out for its human rights situation 'significantly worsening.' The report pointed to unfair treatment of white Afrikaners following the signing of major land reforms that the Trump administration has said discriminate against that minority, which ran the country's apartheid government. That system brutally enforced racial segregation, which oppressed the Black majority, for 50 years before ending in 1994. With the signing of that law in December, the report said that 'South Africa took a substantially worrying step towards land expropriation of Afrikaners and further abuses against racial minorities in the country.' It also said the government 'did not take credible steps to investigate, prosecute and punish officials who committed human rights abuses, including inflammatory racial rhetoric against Afrikaners and other racial minorities, or violence against racial minorities.' This year, the administration admitted as refugees some groups of white Afrikaners. Accusations of European allies restricting right-wing speech The reports take issue with what the Trump administration believes are restrictions on free speech imposed against generally right-wing voices in the United Kingdom, France and Germany. The reports use identical language to say that human rights conditions in each of the three NATO allies 'worsened during the year.' The executive summaries for each of the three reports say 'significant human rights issues included credible reports of serious restrictions on freedom of expression, including enforcement of or threat of criminal or civil laws in order to limit expression; and crimes, violence, or threats of violence motivated by antisemitism.' These governments have rejected such assertions that have been made by senior U.S. officials, including Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Targeting Brazil over allegations of restricting Bolsonaro's speech Similar freedom-of-speech issues were raised in Brazil, which has more recently provoked Trump's ire by prosecuting his ally — former right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro — and led to the imposition of massive U.S. tariffs and sanctions against Brazil's Supreme Court chief justice. 'The human rights situation in Brazil declined during the year,' the report said. 'The courts took broad and disproportionate action to undermine freedom of speech and internet freedom by blocking millions of users' access to information on a major social media platform in response to a case of harassment.' It added that the government 'undermined democratic debate by restricting access to online content deemed to undermine democracy' and specifically mentioned suppressing the speech of Bolsonaro and his supporters.
